


Evil

by glacis



Category: Angel: the Series
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-28
Updated: 2010-01-28
Packaged: 2017-10-06 18:44:50
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,259
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/56684
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glacis/pseuds/glacis
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lindsey and his 'evil' new hand try to start a new life. Fate intrudes. Massive spoilers for Dead End.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Evil

_"Evil," a Lindsey story. Spoilers for “Dead End.”_

Words washed around him and Lindsey let them. As usual, Wolfram and Hart was in the forefront of current affairs -- their latest, a public utility client being sued for price gouging. He offered silent thanks that he lived within LA city limits and didn't have to worry about it, other than getting the client off, of course. Lilah mentioned that litigation would keep them tied up in the courts for years, and he responded that a quick settlement was better PR and cost a hell of a lot less. Then Mr. Reed brought him back to the dull meeting with a thud by asking how Angel was doing.

"Angel? He's up, he's down, he's good, he's bad. He's a barrel of dead monkeys." He couldn't stop the sarcasm lacing his voice. Every time he strapped on his plastic hand, a fresh wave of hatred and loss swept over him. Lilah started babbling, and the majority of his mind tuned out again. The unfortunate thing about his emotional reaction wasn't the existence of the emotions, but the target. His rational self knew that the hatred should be aimed at Angel and the loss at himself. Too often, it felt the other way around. Just went to show how little one could trust emotion.

As expected, in the course of calming the waters Lilah made it blindingly obvious yet again that Angel's consistent target was Lindsey. He gave her a measuring stare and let her ramble. Reed changed the subject and asked about an upcoming meeting with the CFO of a company rightfully fearing lawsuit for poisoning their product and not warning the public until a cancer epidemic claimed enough of their customers that they were **forced** to pay attention. Lilah ruffled her papers and Lindsey answered automatically, "Thursday, at eleven." Earned him another glare. Could he help it if he had a good memory? He didn't even bother with the stare this time. To his well-hidden relief, Reed brought the meeting to a close before Lindsey expired from boredom.

"Friday we'll be re-evaluating your division. You two can catch me up then. Now, let's get to work."

He didn't get two steps from the table before Lilah blocked him.

"Can you stab me in the back a little deeper? I still have feeling in my legs."

There was a wildness behind the habitual chill in her eyes, and he peered up at her. He might have to do something about her soon. It had been okay when they weren't in head to head competition. They'd been allies of a sort and occasional lovers. But she'd made it clear since their dual promotion that he had a target on his ass and she had a rifle in her hands. Metaphorically if not literally. "Lilah -"

She didn't let him finish the sentence. "They're going to re-evaluate us. You know what that means. They'll promote one and cut the other. Around here, that's a literal cutting."

Her voice shook. He sighed silently. She was letting it get to her. That was a good way to end up dead, or worse, around Wolfram and Hart. "Well, nothing lasts forever." He kept his voice completely calm, as was the look he leveled at her. She glared in return.

"That's deep," she hissed. "Why don't you go f-" Reed interrupted before she could lose her cool and tell him to go fuck himself. Lindsey didn't know whether to laugh or be appalled. She really **was** dancing on the edge.

Reed asked sweetly, "Lindsey. Join me in my office?" Lindsey smirked at Lilah and sauntered off to join his boss. Lilah watched with deep suspicion as the old man smiled and placed a paternal hand on Lindsey's shoulder. Lindsey ignored her. He was good at that. He'd had a lot of practice.

"You're making great strides in reclaiming what you lost with your actions earlier this year, Lindsey. It's good to see you acting like your old self, on top of things, not allowing yourself to be distracted. I'm sure Holland would be pleased to note how well his protégé has been handling himself." He paused and forced a fatherly expression on his face. It didn't fit very well. "I'd like to give you one word of advice about your attitude toward Angel. Now, I realize what he did to you was … heartless." Lindsey managed not to flinch. "And naturally your attitude toward him would be … complex." He held back a comment that would have further undermined Reed's opinion of his demeanor. "But it's not very professional to air those feelings around your colleagues. People look up to you around here. Which reminds me. I made an appointment for you. It'll take awhile, so I've cleared your schedule."

That came out of left field. "An appointment?"

"Yes." Reed was smiling at him. It was a strange expression to see on that waxy face. "Well, just a … uhm, well, you'll see."

He laughed lightly, leaving Lindsey bemused. He didn't think he'd ever heard Reed laugh. He must really be coming up in the world to be permitted to witness this much emotion displayed by the man whose nickname, far from the office and seldom spoken aloud, was Dead Man Walking.

Lindsey stared at the card with a mixture of confusion and calculation as he said a pleasant, absent-minded good-bye and left the room. With his peripheral vision he noticed Lilah glaring daggers at him but ignored her to head to his office. He had an hour before he had to go to the medical clinic named on the card, and he had some research to do. He never went into anything blind if there was any way around it.

Forty five minutes later he knew the history of the Fairfield Clinic from its inception to the present day. He had examined profiles of every doctor on its admittedly impressive roster. Its primary purpose seemed to be to provide medical services to the elite of Wolfram and Hart's executive staff. One of the cardiology specialists there had even examined Darla. The memory brought a sharp stab of pain, both to his heart and his stump, and he closed it off before it could distract him. The appointment made no sense to him. As far as he knew, he was perfectly healthy, barring a missing body part and a brain with the tendency to multi-track 24/7. Shrugging, knowing better than to ask any more questions or be late for the appointment, Lindsey put on his suit jacket and headed out into mid-day traffic in downtown LA.

He arrived at the clinic twenty minutes before his appointment time. He looked up at the multi-tiered sandy rose façade for some time before taking a deep breath and heading in. To his surprise, he didn't have to fill out any paperwork. The receptionist had a file already made up on him. When they called his name, he peeked over the nurse's shoulder while she was checking through the chart, and recognized his personal physician's handwriting.

Musing on the lack of confidentiality between a doctor and a patient when that patient worked for Wolfram and Hart, he obediently stepped on the scale, relaxed his arm for the blood pressure cuff and stopped himself from squirming as she stuck the thermometer cup in his ear. At least it was better than the little tabs they used to stick under his tongue. Or the memorable glass thermometers of his childhood. He'd had nightmares for weeks about mercury poisoning when one of his little brothers had bitten through one once.

He was sitting on exam table wondering what the fuck is going on when the doctor came in. The man was disgustingly cheerful.

"Lindsey," he beamed. "I'm Doctor Melman. It's a pleasure to meet you."

His left hand was warmly, if briefly, taken. He offered a lukewarm, "Hi."

Melman leafed through the chart, humming approvingly. "Okay, your basic vitals are good. You've had all the usual childhood diseases, and you're not allergic to any medications." As he was telling the nurse, "Let's start him out with two milligrams of Versed," Lindsey dwelt on the fact that he was one of the few of his siblings to survive those 'usual childhood diseases.' He seldom thought of the losses of his childhood, for good reason. His eyes sharpened as the doctor turned back to him. "It's a little something to relax you before we begin the procedure. Do you have any questions?"

Oh, yeah, he thought, a few, but let's start with the most glaring omission. "One. What the hell is going on?"

Melman appeared somewhat startled. "Your boss didn't tell you?"

Lindsey stared steadily at him. "No." Obviously.

Melman grinned slightly. "They have a funny sense of humor over there."

His internal commentary continuing, Lindsey cracked 'notice me not laughing, doc.' "Yeah. They keep us hopping."

Melman then told him what he already knew. "Your firm is a major source of funding for our clinic. We see most of you for your primary care and whatnot. But there are some other less publicized aspects of our work."

Visions of human experimentation danced in Lindsey's head. "What the hell are they going to do to me?!"

The doctor said instantly, soothingly, "Please, don't -- don't be alarmed. They think the world of you. That's why they moved you to the top of the transplant list."

The world tilted with that one word. Faintly, Lindsey echoed, "Transplant?"

Melman looked smug. "Yes. Your hand. That's why you're here. We're going to give you a new one. Don't look so nervous," he continued as he swabbed Lindsey's upper left arm and reached for a syringe, "it's cause for applause. In just a few hours, you'll be the one doing the applauding."

Lindsey was too busy contemplating having two working hands again to scowl at him for the lousy verbiage. His eyelids started to get heavy. As the doctor left to prep for the surgery the nurse helped him slide off the table and efficiently stripped him down. As she reached for his pants, he made an interrogatory noise, and she mentioned something about operating room safety before denuding him like a baby needing a diaper change. He stood there and let her get on with it, his mind numb with drugs and possibilities. By the time she'd draped him in paper and settled him on the gurney, the world was floating fine if a bit blurry. They could've done any damned thing they wanted to him and he'd've let them.

The ride to the operating room was surreal, but not as surreal as the operation itself. Lights floated above him, faces wove in and out of his field of vision, and sounds seemed to come from nowhere. The world was more pleasantly fuzzy than he could remember it being since he'd been in a drug haze after he lost his hand. The stray thought made him focus on his arm.

It was gone!

He didn't panic. He didn't even giggle, although he really, really wanted to. He did look around for Angel. Body part went missing, gotta find the big guy with the rotten attitude who cleaned up nice. Stifling another giggle, he heard random words float down from the goggle-eyed demon with the blue hat he tentatively identified as Melman. When had he grown the little pair of binocular eyes?

"Let's get the soft tissue ready for incision. Connecting the extensors. You're doing great, Lindsey."

Oh, that was nice to know. He tried to say thanks, but his mouth wouldn't work. There was a tube under his nose. It tickled.

"Where's the Pockla? Release the tourniquet. I'm waiting on the Pockla."

Pookie was coming to the surgery? Cool. He wondered if Garfield would, too. And if the cat would bring lasagna. He was getting a slight case of the munchies. Maybe they'd put a little pot in his shot. He smothered another inappropriate giggle. It had been too long since he'd cut loose with a little inappropriate behavior. He'd have to see about that, when he could move again and his body wasn't mimicking melted Jell-O.

A woman's voice chimed in. Ah, variety. He was getting kind of tired of Melman anyway. "Here it comes."

There was a shushing sound, a sub-vocal hum, and the hair on the back of Lindsey's neck stood up, anesthesia be damned. There was magick in the air. He could smell it. His eyes sharpened in an automatic defensive reflex, ridiculous as it was since he couldn't do anything to help himself. A tall, vague red outline loomed over the doctor's shoulder and impossibly long gnarled hands reached out toward Lindsey's helpless body. He could feel himself cowering away internally even as none of his muscles so much as twitched.

A burning scent, sulfur and sandalwood incense, caught his sinuses. For the first time since the shot, he could feel something through the numbness. A cold sensation swept up his arm and into his shoulder, then down into his chest, followed immediately by a rush of heat that soon settled into a comforting warmth. Then the numbness seeped back in. Icy hot, his mind supplied, and he flashed on a pulled calf muscle in the gym. Not exactly in the same category, but the feeling was weirdly alike.

The doctor's voice broke rudely into his reverie. "Okay, let's get him to post-op."

Another nausea-inducing ride back to a nice, quiet room, and he stared at the holes in the ceiling tile until they stopped dancing with one another. After an hour or so, the blonde came back in and helped him sit up. Lindsey proved to her satisfaction that he could, indeed, walk and pee, before she allowed him to get dressed. Then a nondescript man wearing the understated livery of a Wolfram and Hart driver guided him back to the front office. He was handed a bag with a bottle of pills in it and signed off on three pages of post-operation instructions. Finally, he was allowed to escape.

Lindsey spent the drive back to his apartment staring at his new hand. He was afraid to move it. They hadn't put any bandages on it, and there was a thin red scar around his forearm where the new limb had been joined to his arm. It tingled slightly from residual magick all the way down through his bones. It itched a little.

He didn't scratch. Didn't know what might happen if he did and didn't want to risk it.

Back at his apartment, he shook off the driver with a smile of thanks and leaned against the back wall of the elevator, staring straight ahead at nothing in particular. It had been a wild day. The after-affects of surgery were starting to get to him, and the itch was mutating into an ache. Once inside, he marveled at the ease with which he unlocked the door, handled his coat and locked the door behind himself, an ease he had missed like hell since losing his hand. He stripped off as he walked to the bedroom. Tracking sideways into the bathroom long enough to brush his teeth and pop a Percocet, he climbed into bed naked and buried his face in the pillow.

He was whole again. It didn't feel as weird as he had the feeling it should.

The drugs and the day caught up with him, and he was asleep before he knew it. His dreams were cloudy, drenched in the color of blood and the smell of sulfur. He woke at his normal time, a few minutes before the alarm went off, with a residual headache and an itch at his groin.

His left hand was draped over his head, and his hand was asleep. He peered blearily at it, flexing his fingers to get rid of the pins and needles. His other hand squeezed reflexively and he stilled. His fingers, fingers he hadn't had the day before, were wrapped around his cock. Not moving, just holding it. Comfortable. A little warm. Half-hard and enjoying the feeling. He gave it a few seconds thought before deciding against jerking off. His curiosity was getting the better of him.

Drawing his hand slowly away from his crotch, he pulled his arm out from under the blanket, a habit left over from the nights when his stump would ache from the cool night air. Holding his new hand a few inches from his face, he examined it intently. It felt natural. However they'd done it, they'd done a hell of a good job. He curled his fingers into a fist then relaxed them again, twisted his wrist, flexed the muscles in his forearm for the sheer joy of feeling them move under the skin. The novelty would no doubt wear off, but until it did, the simple movements were literally better than sex.

The alarm clicked and the weather report droned out. Lindsey reached out as he did every morning, grinning internally as he pressed the button with a finger and cut off the announcer's voice.

It was going to take awhile for **this** novelty to wear off.

His morning routine seldom varied, but there was a freshness to it that made him ridiculously aware of every move he made. Since he'd lost his hand to Angel's scythe, he'd felt unbalanced. Awkward. Clumsy. Holding his hands under the faucet to catch water and splash it on his face, he reveled in the efficiency of movement he'd missed for the past several months. Opening the closet to choose a tie, he mused that he could go back to a regular tie rack now, since he didn't need to waste an entire Saturday afternoon knotting the damned things again. Glancing down in the corner and pausing as he did every morning, he looked at his guitar.

Grinned.

Flexed his new picking hand.

Took his guitar from its resting place against the coats in the back and wandered back into his bedroom. He could be a little late. He didn't have any meetings until eleven, and he already had some ideas for that one. Then he perched on the side of the bed and strummed his new fingers across the strings.

Winced.

Spent the next several minutes tuning the guitar. He hadn't done more than look at it for a long time. Hadn't even been able to listen to the kind of music he used to make, believing that he'd never make it again. Tchaikovsky had been his best friend during the months he'd been crippled. Lots of sweeping, complicated music without words. No temptation.

He gave in to that temptation now. His hands moved over the strings and the music moved through him. Muscles held tensed for months slowly relaxed as he lost himself in the melody. Music filled his mind and traveled down to the soles of his feet. It was the only time his brain stopped ticking over, the only thing he could completely surrender to, the only time he was completely at peace. He'd missed it.

He hadn't realized how much he'd needed it until he couldn't have it. His grin softened and turned rueful. Wasn't that the way it always was? He sang softly, a few lines to a song he'd been working on before the entire Darla fiasco. Something simple. Something true.

So little of his life could be thus described.

An hour later he forced himself to stop, replacing the guitar gently in the closet and pulling a jacket from a hanger. His sore fingertips tingled, keeping the smile on his lips.

He was more jovial at work than he'd been in months, unsurprisingly. His charm was turned on full power, and everyone from the security guard to Nathan Reed responded. Irv Kraigle, the CFO of the chocolate company who'd been poisoning their clients until they got caught and who were now looking to Wolfram and Hart to save their collective asses, beamed at him.

Lilah, joining the small gathering a minute later, was not beaming. She looked like she might throw up, although she covered it quickly. She was a professional, he had to give her that. Reed showed Kraigle to his office, and Lindsey moved to follow. Lilah stopped him and pulled him aside.

There was ice in her whisper as she hissed at him. "That's an expensive operation. The Shaman alone's, what, a quarter mill? I guess they like you." Her smile was painfully bright and as sharp-edged as a sword. It matched the slightly manic gleam in her eye. "They really, really like you!"

Lindsey's reply was equally low-voiced, and while he kept his pleasant expression, his eyes were hard. "Client's waiting."

She didn't take the hint. "I know you **think** you've got this thing in the bag -"

He didn't have time for this crap. "I don’t **think** anything, Lilah," he cut in. She looked at him incredulously.

"Oh, you're the one in pain here? Ugh." She gave an inelegant snort. "I can't believe they chose you over me."

She stalked away into the office. He gave an inaudible sigh and followed her, his shining mood of the morning tarnished once again by reality. His mind was only partly on the meeting, but it was more than enough to follow the action. Most of his thoughts were centered on the future. He had to make some decisions, and crunch time was coming soon. He had to be prepared. He hated getting caught off-guard. When he did, he made decisions based on emotion, and they usually came back to bite him in the ass.

Lilah's voice chattered on about jury tampering, via bribery or enchantment, and he broke in before she could dig them any deeper into that particular hole. She really had to learn to read their clients better. This one couldn't handle direct admission of illegality. He spun a tale of a spurious offshoot company that would take the fall for the deadly tins, then go bankrupt before anyone could sue them. Kraigle beamed again. Lilah nodded and went along for the ride.

Kraigle congratulated him on his legal brilliance and asked him if he was getting it all down. Before Lindsey could allow his tongue to run with the obvious and tell Kraigle he didn't need to write it down since it was his own idea, he glanced down at the pad.

Nearly peed his four hundred dollar wool-blend trousers.

He hadn't realized he'd been doodling. He didn't doodle. Subconscious scribbling could be used against a man, and at Wolfram and Hart that use was often worse than fatal. But he'd apparently been doodling since he sat down, and he **really** didn't like what his subconscious was throwing up at him. Especially since he had the sneaking suspicion it didn't come from his subconscious.

His id had no reason to be scrawling KILL all over a yellow pad.

He gulped, his throat dry, and felt his eyes bulge a little as he stared down at his 'notes.' 'Kill' was written in block capitals, some re-traced for emphasis, at odd angles all over the page. He stared at his brand new hand.

His hand was talking to him. He didn't like what it was saying.

His entire mind tuned out of the meeting as he stared at the frightening graffiti littering his note pad. Swallowing a few times, he realized just how close he was to losing his breakfast, and cleared his throat with some difficulty. Uttering a strangled, "I have to go," he made a break for the door. Behind him, he heard Irv asking if everything was all right, and Lilah chirpily reassuring him.

The slightly hysterical thought struck him that sure, everything was fine, discounting the fact that he was now apparently the proud possessor of a homicidal hand. He made his way single-mindedly to his office, closing and locking the door, stifling a wild chuckle at the thought that he was locking himself in the room with evil incarnate in his own right hand, so what good would locks do?

At that thought, he half-ran directly into the washroom and knelt in front of the toilet, barely getting the lid up before he was throwing up. He stayed there until his stomach finally calmed down, then shakily washed his face, brushed his teeth and combed his hair.

With his right hand.

He stared into the mirror for a moment, then dropped the comb in the sink and dropped back to his knees to throw up again. Twenty minutes later he returned to his grooming ritual, regaining a measure of his composure as he combed his hair.

With his left hand.

Eventually he was able to leave the washroom. Sitting at his desk, he stared blankly at the folders scattered atop his desktop for an hour or so before giving work up as a bad deal. It wasn't quite three in the afternoon when he gathered his jacket and briefcase and headed down to the parking garage. The fleeting thought struck that this would be a good time for Angel to come after him again. It would be an interesting match-up, Angel versus The Evil Hand. He shook off the thought, smiling vacantly at the guard as he accelerated out of the garage. He had no memory of the drive home once he got there, staring around the underground garage of his apartment building like he'd never seen it before.

One of these days he was going to remember that any blessing he received was bound to be mixed at best, and typically it'd be a curse in disguise. **Before** he got all excited about it.

By the time he got his front door locked behind him, his stomach was rebelling again. He made it to the bathroom just in time to throw up. Resting his aching head against the cool porcelain, he sighed. Nothing left to come up, but he was still trying, and his stomach was tied in knots.

Anger started to build in the pit of his stomach, overcoming some of the cramps. He splashed water on his face again, brushed his teeth for the fifth time that day, and wandered out to stand in the middle of his living room. He glanced over at the bar but decided against a drink. Didn't dare lose control. Didn't want to give the Evil Hand a chance to turn on him. God only knew what it might do.

Rolling his shoulders to ease out some of the tension, he muttered "Fuck it," and went to the closet for his guitar. It took some time, but eventually he relaxed back into the music. Feeling calmer than he had since the morning meeting after picking strings until his fingers ached, he set the guitar aside and went into the kitchen.

Calling himself every kind of coward, he had a cup of soup for dinner. He didn't trust himself with a fork in case his hand decided to stab him with it. Dim memories from an old Michael Caine movie about a possessed hand that went around killing people kept creeping up on him and creeping him out.

Demons he could handle. Smile at them, sign contracts with them, shake their hands and buy them drinks. Most of them were the epitome of evil, or they wouldn't need Wolfram and Hart's services. It didn't bother him. It was just business. But when it was moving through his own hand, it was too goddamned close for comfort.

By eight that evening, Lindsey was starting to chastise himself for being paranoid, ridiculous and borderline insane. His hand felt perfectly normal. No urges to reach for his gun and blow his own brains out. He looked down at his hand, then over at his desk, then back at his hand.

Maybe it just **wrote** evil things, didn't **do** them.

Deciding it was worth a shot, if only to keep himself from going completely around the bend, he sat down at the desk. Pulled out a sheet of paper and a pen. Held the pen loosely in his right hand and waited for it to channel a killing impulse.

Nothing happened.

He poked it with his left hand. It sat there. Inert. No spirit-writing. No blood lust. No nothing.

He frowned at it. Maybe it had been a random impulse? He'd had random murderous impulses before. Usually around Angel. He beat them down just as he beat down the random sexual impulses. Either would be stupid, and he strove not to be stupid.

Calling himself an idiot, he dug his letter opener out of the drawer and took a deep breath. Stuck the point of it into his right hand.

Other than a prick of blood standing out against the fine skin of his new, odd hand, there was no response. He stabbed it again, twice.

Nothing.

Going for broke, he flipped the letter opener around until it was pointing in the general direction of his chest and waiting for the impulse to strike out. His heartbeat was loud in his ears, but nothing happened at all.

Dropping the opener, he stared at his hand. It didn't look evil. It looked … normal. "What are you?" he asked softly. Later, thinking back on it, he couldn't help but feel grateful he lived alone. If anyone had seen him asking his hand questions, they'd've had him carted off to the loony bin.

It didn't matter. The hand's evil remained in a state of hibernation. Sighing deeply, he went into the kitchen and rinsed off the spots of blood. Flexing his fingers absently, he straightened his shoulders and made a decision. He couldn't figure this one out on his own, and it was too important a question to leave unanswered.

Grabbing his guitar on the way out the door, he made his way to Caritas. Lorne would help him out. He had to.

The demon collecting cover charges had changed, but he sensed no hostility from Lindsey and waved him through. Lorne stood at the bar in a truly atrocious quilted silver metallic jacket that only Lorne could have carried off. He looked up from the bar, his deep red eyes brightening when he saw Lindsey making his way through the early evening crowd.

"Sweet pea!" he crowed. Lindsey winced. Darla had called him that. Lorne frowned, picking up on the mental image and its residual pain. "Sorry, honey. But it's great to see you! And with your instrument, too." He glanced down at Lindsey's right hand. "Both of them. That's wonderful."

"Hi," Lindsey answered shortly. He liked Lorne, but he was too strung out to be polite. It had been a rough couple days. Empathic as always, Lorne patted his shoulder and led him directly to the stage.

"I can tell you're more than up for this. Well, be my guest, babycakes. We’ve missed you around here." He sounded sincere. Lindsey smiled at him.

"Thanks." He couldn't say he'd missed it. It would have been too painful to be here and not be able to make music.

"Of course," Lorne answered the emotion, not the spoken word, as he often did. "Make yourself at home." He bounded gracefully onstage and addressed the audience as Lindsey moved a stool and the microphone stand into position. "It's my very great pleasure to welcome to the Caritas stage your favorite and mine. Blue eyes is back!"

Since it had been some months since the last time Lindsey had sung, the announcement was met with tepid applause from the majority of the crowd and two wolf whistles from a couple long-time regulars. Lindsey smiled briefly, mainly at Lorne, as the host placed the microphone on the stand and waved him elegantly into the spotlight.

As always, the light blanked out the faces staring at him, and he soon lost himself in the sway of the song. The background noise faded, as the audience got caught up with him. He sang lyrics he'd written months ago, before the night of the Raising that had ended so disastrously. It was the first time he'd sung it anywhere outside his bedroom walls.

"Pretty girl on every corner, sunshine turning the air to gold. Warm, it's always warm here. I can't take the cold." He never had been able to. It was one reason why he'd come west -- he'd hated the Oklahoma winters. Cold meant death, of people, of hopes, of dreams. "This whole world shines so brightly," not that the warmth was any closer to life. It covered more evil than he'd known even as a child. Dreams could, and did, die as harshly in California as they did in the Panhandle. He fought back the thoughts and concentrated on the music.

"Pretty, as a picture, settles me with love and laughter. I can't feel a thing." When had he lost the ability to feel? He'd thought he'd regained it with Darla, but she'd been a substitute. For what, he wasn't sure. Maybe some of those dead dreams.

Maybe Angel.

"There goes me with love and laughter, and I can't feel a thing." Hell, when was the last time he'd even laughed, and meant it? His voice held a cry that added poignancy to the lyrics. "Sky's gonna open, people gonna pray and crawl." And it won't do them any good at all. "Sky's gonna open, gonna rain down in lightning. Sky's gonna open, people gonna pray and sing." And it won't do us any good at all. "Oh, I can't feel …"

He flashed his hand across the strings in the final chord, and bowed his head. He felt naked, like he'd shown much more to Lorne, and all of them, than he could afford to show. The wash of applause was quite a lot more enthusiastic than that which had greeted him. He barely acknowledged it. That wasn't why he was here.

He made a beeline for Lorne, who greeted him with a wide smile, white teeth vivid against red lips and green skin. "Golly, pilgrim, it sure is good to have you back in the saddle." Lindsey ignored the cowboy humor. Lorne had needled him kindly with that since the first time he'd sung. Then he handed Lindsey a drink. "Your favorite. TnT. The imported."

Impatient with the civilities, Lindsey took the glass and stared up into Lorne's face. "Look, I got a crazy man's hand here, wants to kill … someone, maybe me. What do you see?"

As usual, he didn't have a clue how to interpret the answer he got. "Well, you know what they say." Lorne took Lindsey's shoulder and steered him toward the bar. "The hand is quicker than the eye. You'll get that later." His expression must have made it clear he hadn't understood.

Confused but undeterred, Lindsey barely repressed desperation as he told the host, "Look, I need help." He was startled when Lorne didn't answer.

Angel did.

"I'll say. You might want to start with his singing."

Lindsey glared over at Angel. He was vaguely aware there were others on the periphery of his vision, but he concentrated on Angel. It always seemed to be that way.

A girl stepped up close to him, and he glanced briefly at her. She looked stunned.

"Hi, you probably don't remember me. Cordelia. I know you're evil …" There was that word again! After a little pause when he didn't react, she kept going. "… and everything, but that was just so amazing."

He continued to not react. He was too busy glaring at Angel. A Black man to the left of Angel piped up. "That was kinda tight." Lindsey absently tagged him as Gunn but didn't answer.

Then the Englishman peered around Angel's shoulder. "Terrific. Really." Wesley. He sounded terribly sincere. Angel didn't appear to appreciate all their appreciation.

"Is everyone drunk?"

Lindsey continued ignoring everyone but Angel and addressed the host. "What's he doing here?" He could no more keep the snarl out of his voice than he could voluntarily stop breathing. "Huh?" He turned to challenge Angel directly. "What are you lookin' at?" He could hear his accent thicken, but also as usual when it came to Angel, he couldn't do a thing to control it.

Lorne threw his hands up. "Easy, easy, children. I don't allow violence in my club. Angel's here for the same reason you are."

Instantly suspicious, Lindsey shared a glare between the host and the vampire. "How's that?"

"Two enemies, one case." Lorne sounded almost dreamy. "All coming together in a beautiful, buddy-movie kind of way."

Gunn gave voice to Lindsey's thought before Lindsey could. "They supposed to work together on this?"

Lindsey could hear his voice hardening and rising as he responded, directly the vitriol at Lorne. "Work with him?" He glared over at Angel again. "Work with **him**?!"

This time, Lorne sounded wistful. "Am I the only one here who saw _48 Hours_?"

It was more than Lindsey could take, on top of the day he'd already had. The host made a lousy matchmaker. "I've got a murderous hand on me, and you're telling me to team up with the guy who cut mine off in the first place?"

Lorne shook a finger in his face. Lindsey was irresistibly reminded of his mother doing the same thing to him more times than he could count. "I'm telling you what's what, sugar. What you do with it is up to you."

What he had to do was get the hell out of there before he did anything really stupid, like try to stake Angel in the middle of Caritas and have Lorne's bouncers get medieval on his ass. Taking a single gulp of his drink, he slapped it on the bar next to Cordelia. Turning away from Lorne, he glared daggers at Angel and shouldered his way through the crowd toward the steps leading out of the club.

"If I see you outside the club, I'm going to kill you." Angel smirked at him.

Lindsey stomped up the stairs and out into the blessedly cool night with Lorne's voice following him out the door, something about resentment being an ugly emotion. Yeah, well, ugly was what he was going to visit on Angel if he got in Lindsey's way on this one. He made his way back to his car. Since he hadn't been able to get any help from Lorne, he's going to have to do it the old fashioned way.

Break, enter, cast and steal.

Heading back to the firm, he made a short stop at a small supplies shop on one of the darker side streets off the Strip. Paying for his purchases in cash, he nodded his thanks to the Greilor demon in Judy Garland drag at the cash register and continued on his way to Wolfram and Hart. Once there, he climbed up the side staircase toward his office. Safely inside, he locked the door and placed his small shopping bag with the embossed pentagram on the side in the middle of his desktop. Taking a deep, head-clearing breath, he calmed his thoughts and centered himself.

Casting the circle was second nature. Adding the layers of protection that would enable him to wrap a glamour around himself was tougher, but doable. He pulled a blank identification card from his wallet and laid it to the side of the small bowl of indigo and cream powder in the center of his desk.

Chanting softly in Aramaic, he watched the powders swirl together. They traced words in the air that he committed to memory, then laced the magnetic strip along the back of the card, sinking into the black ink until they disappeared. He waited respectfully for the encryption code spell to finish, then opened his laptop and blessed it. The metal and plastic hummed under his hand, the reassuring buzz of live magick.

Reed's own password was too deeply protected to steal, but Charlie Spenser's hadn't been. Using Charlie's account, he hacked into the secure server and stole Reed's password. Backing out as delicately as he'd hacked in, careful to leave as few traces as possible to cover himself and ensuring that the few traces he left would lead to the other man, Lindsey powered down his computer.

The final spell was multi-layered and trickier to pull off. The glamour he cast to disguise his image as Phil's to the security cameras worked with no problem, and he slid through the halls like a ghost, secure in the knowledge that any stray electronic eyes pointed his direction would see a guard, not a lawyer. The enchanted identification card worked like the charm it was, and the door opened to his touch. Once at the threshold, the secondary layer of magickal defenses kicked in. Spells shifted over and around him, disguising his presence to the myriad of unearthly defenses Reed had erected throughout his office.

It would put a real crimp in Lindsey's plans to suddenly go up in a shower of sparks, or disintegrate into a pile of ashes, just because he tripped the wrong invisible wire.

Once at Reed's desk, the final glamour cut in. His fingerprints disappeared as he booted up the computer, and the electrical circuits pulsed after each bit of data he retrieved, covering his prying completely. The file on Lilah was the first he opened, out of sheer curiosity, as well as to see what the Firm had on her plans for himself. It confirmed his suspicions.

Lilah was scheduled to become demon kibble by noon on Friday.

Always intent on checking his facts, the better to manipulate them, Lindsey opened his own file next. Promotion was definitely on the agenda. Along with future plans, and he didn't like the looks of them. He was well-respected, yes, but one of the main reasons he was scheduled for promotion over destruction was due to Angel's continuing interest in him. Wolfram and Hart remained intent on the final turning of Angel, and Lindsey would either orchestrate it or be the bait for it. It was immaterial to the Firm which option had to be taken.

It made a world of difference to Lindsey.

'No way in hell, not again,' rang through his mind as he closed the file and ran through Reed's to-do list until he found a folder for the clinic where he'd gotten his apparently evil hand. Perhaps it was evil with periods of suspended animation. He shrugged. One way or another, he'd get the answers he needed. He was good at digging.

A few moments later he found payment records for a flunky named Roy Berger, used by the Fairfield Clinic, paid by Wolfram and Hart. Paid handsomely, too. He checked the cross references. The man was a parole officer. Lived in an apartment in Culver City. Not far away. Memorizing the address, he powered down the computer, muttering a few words of archaic Greek over it to set the confusion spell in the circuitry.

Slipping out of the office, he dissipated spells as he went. He'd been careful when casting them to ensure that his trace signature mirrored Lilah's, so if the Shamen did catch anything, it would smell like her, not himself. Out in the hall, he was turning toward the back stairs to leave when he heard a movement. Reaching out with his mind, he felt the residual brush of magick. Knowing he was still Phil to the cameras, he tracked the sound to the file room.

Somebody else was working late.

Lilah, looking more desperate than was becoming but not as desperate as the circumstances would warrant, was going through files Lindsey himself had copied months before, during the Brewer case when he'd thought he was going to leave Wolfram and Hart and would need protection when he ran. He wondered if she knew about the records on computer disks down in the vault, then shrugged it off. She'd get the protection she could find. It would have to be enough.

Maybe.

Turning options over in his mind, he backed away from the file room and left her to her work. Once out of the Firm's camera range he said a few words and sketched a figure in the air, effectively dispersing the final spell. Climbing into the Jag he headed for Culver City.

Parking outside the apartment building where Roy lived and glancing around critically as he climbed the stairs to the third floor, Lindsey mentally calculated bribes. Judging by the surroundings, it shouldn't cost him much for the answers he needed. The guy'd probably be glad for the money.

Stopping outside number 34, he knocked firmly. After a moment, the sound of the television inside muted and he heard a muffled voice.

"Who is it?"

Lindsey put confidence and harmlessness in his voice. "You don't know me. My name's Lindsey McDonald. I work for Wolfram and Hart."

The door opened, and suspicious dark eyes in a boxer's face peered over the chain at him.

"What do you want?"

Looking as innocent as possible, Lindsey answered, "I want to talk to you. Just for a moment. Can I come in?"

Roy let him in, watchfully. Lindsey glanced over his shoulder and caught the man peering out into the hallway.

"No, it's okay," Lindsey reassured him. "I'm alone."

"Professional habit." Roy closed the door and followed him into the room, still watching him suspiciously. His hands were behind his back. Lindsey suspected they were either bunched into fists or holding some sort of weapon. "I see a lot of lowlifes."

Lindsey made himself as non-threatening as possible, while still projecting confidence. "Yes, I guess you would, being a parole officer." He switched into persuasive mode, a strategy that had given him the best won-cases percentage in the Firm. "Listen, this is completely off the record. I had a procedure done at Fairfield Clinic. I know they've paid you to do things for them in the past. And I don't care about that. What I do care is finding out where they get their body parts."

Roy didn't look persuaded, and his reply didn't make sense. "What's the code?"

"Code?" Lindsey asked, confused by the question.

"Well, if you're with Wolfram and Hart, you'll know the code."

Lindsey was getting impatient. "Look, I'm a lawyer there, but this is not my case. I don't know the code. We don't need a code. I can pay you-"

Wrong answer. Roy slapped Lindsey hard enough to send him reeling across the room and slamming into a table. As he tried to rise Roy punched him to the floor. Before he could get his breath back, Roy yanked him up by his shirt and pinned him against the wall, bringing a gun up to point it between his eyes at point-blank range. So **that's** what he'd had behind his back. Lindsey felt himself getting light-headed from the blows and wondered what the fuck had just happened. Trying to focus on Roy's now-explicitly threatening face, tasting blood from a split lip trickling down the right side of his mouth, Lindsey tried to regain some control of the situation.

"Now you got three seconds to tell me what the game is," Roy growled.

Giving up on persuasion, Lindsey tried pleading. "There is no game, all right? This is about me!"

Wrong answer again. Roy wasted no more time beating Lindsey up. He simply cocked the gun and said, "Good-bye."

Lindsey involuntarily shut his eyes, knowing he was about to die. A crashing noise distracted them both as a crate came flying through the window. Roy plucked Lindsey away from the wall, using him as a shield with an arm around his neck and holding the pistol rock-steady at his temple. He dragged Lindsey over to the window. Apart from the rage and terror roiling through him, Lindsey had a sick feeling he knew precisely who was responsible for that crate.

"Friend of yours?" Roy asked him unpleasantly.

Not if he's who I think he is, Lindsey thought, then choked out, "No, he's -" Lack of oxygen and Roy's impatience cut him off before he could say more.

Putting his head out the now-open window, Roy yelled "Hey! I'm about to put a bullet in your buddy's brain here!" Getting no response, he made the idiot mistake of leaning to look out the window. "I got him," he muttered, more to himself than to Lindsey, who would have told him better if he'd been able to squeeze a word out past the beefy arm clamped around his throat. "I know I got him."

The choking noise Roy made as a rope came out of nowhere and made a noose around his neck was one of the sweetest sounds Lindsey had ever heard, regardless of the fact that the source of the rope was the biggest pain in the ass Lindsey had ever met. Still, he took advantage of Roy's sudden inattention to twist out of his grip and take the gun away from him. Whirling away out of reach, he saw exactly who he expected to see holding on to the ends of the rope.

Angel.

Lindsey still yelped at him incredulously. "What are you doing here?"

As sarcastically as usual, Angel replied, "Gee, I don't know. Saving your life?"

Instantly incensed, Lindsey barked back, "I don't need you to save my life!" Not sure who he wanted to hurt more, he waved the gun wildly between Angel and Roy. Now it was Roy's turn to look nervous.

"Hey! Watch it with that thing!"

The sarcasm got thicker as Angel continued, ignoring Roy for the moment to concentrate on Lindsey. "A little gratitude, Lindsey, goes a long way."

By that time Lindsey was so pissed off he couldn't make his tongue work right. Sputtering, his accent back with a vengeance, he howled, "You've got no business -- why -- why aren't you tryin' to kill me?!" Fighting to control himself, he tried not to wave the gun, but the need to move was too strong to resist. He punctuated his words with fierce chopping motions, wishing the gun was a stake, wishing Angel was on the end of it.

Angel sounded ridiculously offended. "Excuse me. I'm on a case here, Lindsey. Does everything always have to be about killing you all the time?"

Roy chose that moment to try to make his move. In as conciliating a voice as he could manage while arched over a windowsill between a madman choking him and another madman holding his own gun on him, he said in a patented hostage negotiator's tone, "I can see you guys got issues, so I'll just -" Angel pulled back on the rope, choking his voice off.

More than half afraid Angel would accidentally yank Roy's head off before he could learn anything useful, Lindsey reacted with pure unadulterated fury. "That's my lead! You're choking my lead!!"

Angel's mocking response added fuel to the fire raging through Lindsey. "He's my lead! He's my lead!" he sang in a sickening falsetto. "What, are we on the school yard around here? Now look, if you want to get to the bottom of this, you're going to have to learn to play with others." Lindsey could feel himself starting to shake. Angel spoke directly to Roy. "Okay, look. I'm going to loosen the rope here, and you're going to tell me all about your parolee Bradley Scott."

Caught off-guard, Lindsey asked "Who?"

"The guy whose hand you're wearing," Angel informed him gleefully. "You might want to listen up."

This, of course, rendered Lindsey instantly furious again. Even as he was yelling, he wondered why his much-vaunted self-control always seemed to disappear around Angel. "You don't tell me what to do!"

Angel told Roy, aimed directly at Lindsey, "He's so immature."

Fed up to the back teeth, Lindsey screamed, "**Shut up**!!"

As usual, Angel ignored Lindsey's fury and told Roy, "We're waiting."

Roy was not any more forthcoming with Angel than he'd been with Lindsey, a fact that cheered Lindsey up disproportionately to the situation. "I'm not telling you zip. You can kill me but Wolfram and Hart'll do a lot worse."

"Kill you? Why would I kill you," Angel vamped out and leered evilly at Roy, "when I could live off you for a month?" Then he pinched Roy's cheek and asked Lindsey happily, "Can't you just taste that butter fat?"

Roy's obvious panic deflated Lindsey more than he cared to admit. Torn between repulsion and awareness of just how much he got off on Angel vamping out, he blurted, "You are really gross, you know that?" It was always like that. Something about Angel, the menace, the power, shit, maybe the juvenile humor, **something** about him turned Lindsey on. It was enough to make Lindsey wish he'd staked Angel the very first day he'd shown up at the Firm. Except even then he hadn't been able to do it.

Damn it.

Back in the present, Roy was freaking out. Not unexpected, given the option of becoming a living blood bank for a maniacally cheerful vampire. "I'll tell ya! I'll tell ya! Scott stole some bearer bonds. Went to jail. When he got paroled, Wolfram and Hart had him assigned to me."

Lindsey listening, fascinated, thinking hard. When it came right down to it, he didn't care …much … who got the information as long as he found out what he needed to know.

Angel continued to grill Roy. "According to your file, he was a fugitive no-show. But you saw him, didn't you?"

Roy gasped "Just once."

Trying to make sense of this, Lindsey probed, "You took him to Fairfield Clinic?"

The answer surprised him. "No, I didn't take him there."

"Where?"

Roy made a helpless sound. "Just some address! I don't know what they do there, and I don't want to know."

Angel pulled Roy backward through the window, tossed him over his shoulder and headed down the fire escape, calling over his shoulder to Lindsey, "Got any duct tape?"

Lindsey stepped over to the window and stared down at the shape effortlessly hauling ass down the ladder. As was par for the course where the vampire was concerned, he felt two steps behind the action. Taking a deep breath, he pivoted on his heel and headed for the stairs. Meeting them at the car, he watched Angel tie Roy up and toss him in the trunk. Angel gave him a bright, interrogatory look. Lindsey glared back.

"Must've left it in my other suit."

Angel shook his head in mock despair, then pulled a roll out from under Roy, saying cheerfully, "That's why **I** always come prepared!" as he ripped off a strip and plastered it over Roy's mouth. Then he stuffed the hapless man down flat in the trunk and slammed the lid closed. Lindsey didn't wait for him, simply stomped around to the passenger side of the convertible and threw himself in the seat. He felt like a little kid, all pissed off and nobody to hit.

At least, nobody he could hit who wouldn't hit him back, a hell of a lot harder.

They sat at the curb for a moment, Lindsey steadfastly refusing to meet Angel's stare. Eventually, Angel reached over, grabbed his chin in an iron grip and jerked his head around. Before Lindsey could move or protest, Angel darted forward and licked away the streak of blood from his split lip.

Lindsey's breath caught in his throat.

He didn't get the chance to react before Angel let go of him, put the car in gear and pulled out into traffic. Unable to think of a thing to say, Lindsey ground his teeth together and glared out into the night. His mind kept replaying the rasp of tongue against his skin, and every time it did he got a little angrier.

His attitude didn't impact Angel in the least. As they drove, he kept up his irritatingly cheerful attitude. Lindsey wanted to stake him. Or fuck him. Or something. Not sure what would come out of his mouth if he opened it, he kept it clamped shut. Finally Angel must have gotten bored, because he started a one-sided conversation.

"Beautiful night, isn't it? I love it in May, before it starts to get real hot, but after the April showers. Not that I see much of the May flowers, being out at night and all, but it's still nice."

Great. Stuck in a car with Angel, who'd just made the vampiric equivalent of a pass at him, and they were talking about … the weather. Lindsey could feel Angel looking at him, but he continued to stare straight ahead. Doing his best to ignore Angel's babbling, he tried to sort out his tangled emotions. He mentally cursed the fact that nearly getting killed always seemed to leave him with a hard-on, and he determinedly blamed the adrenaline rush for his arousal, not Angel's surprise lick-attack.

"A funny thing happened the other day."

Lindsey tried to tune out the storyteller pestering him from the driver's seat. It didn't work, but he didn't let it show. No need to give Angel any encouragement, when he obviously needed none.

"A guy picks up a butcher knife. Sticks it in his own eye. Yow!" Lindsey barely controlled his start at the yelp. Angel continued, oblivious. "I guess he went to the same clinic you did." A chill ran down Lindsey's spine. "Your hand hasn't been doing anything …funny lately, has it?"

He couldn't stand it any more and gave in, shooting Angel a killing glare. It bounced right off. Typical. Angel continued to ooze false sympathy. It was making Lindsey feel a little sick.

"It's none of my business, but you don't seem all that happy."

This being more than any human could stand without responding, and not having a stake at hand, Lindsey finally broke. His accent thick as maple syrup, he growled, "Y'know, I know you're mister Save-a-Soul now, but at least you used to throw down with your enemies. What do you want to do now? You want to share?" He infused the word with every ounce of disgust he could muster. Angel gave him a sympathetic look and Lindsey barely restrained himself from walloping the bastard upside the head.

His voice tantalizingly gentle, pissing off and turning on Lindsey simultaneously, Angel mused, "I guess it's a lot to carry. I mean, losing Darla, and even me, in a way," the world fuzzed out as Lindsey considered how bereft those words actually made him feel, before Angel continued, "as a place to focus your rage."

Rage? Lindsey groaned silently. Angel had no idea! Rage was only one tiny little part of a whole bucketful of things Lindsey focused on him.

"It's ironic. I mean, here you are." Angel kept up the brisk patter, unknowingly giving Lindsey the chance to catch his breath from the mental images of all the different kinds of attention he'd like to focus on Angel. Manacles, satin sheets, and stakes all had their place. Angel droned on. "Young and healthy, good job, new hand. It seems like the more you get the less you have. Am I getting through here?"

Lindsey stared determinedly ahead, not sure what he'd do if he actually allowed his tensed muscles to respond. Kill him? Kiss him? Tough call.

"You just keep on moping. You're good at that."

Angel finally, **finally** shut up. Not for the first time, Lindsey wondered if Angel could smell Lindsey's arousal and anger, and if he got off on it. He sure seemed to be enjoying himself more than could be natural for a vampire who wasn't actively eating anyone.

An eternity later, comprised of tuneless humming from Angel that nearly drove Lindsey nuts and smoldering, if tangled, thoughts of sex and death from Lindsey, they pulled up outside the Southern California Travel Agency. Relieved to have something else to occupy his mind, Lindsey snorted derisively at the lack of imagination in the naming of Wolfram and Hart front companies. Stepping out of the car, he walked around to join Angel as the vampire plucked Roy out of the trunk just far enough to show him the building. Lindsey felt vaguely disconnected, adrift, caught up in events beyond his control.

Same old, same old.

"Is that where you took him?" Angel asked Roy. The man nodded and grunted through the duct tape, protesting incoherently as he was unceremoniously shoved back in the trunk. Angel took out a battle-ax and slammed the trunk lid shut. He headed toward the building, Lindsey at his heels. Over his shoulder, he asked casually, "Do you know this place?"

"No." Never heard of it until Angel himself had choked it out of Lindsey's lead. He scowled at the pavement under his feet.

Angel carried on, still oblivious to Lindsey's mood. "Well, I'm thinking if it has anything to do with you guys, security will be top-drawer. Window sensors, motion detectors, cellular back-up, guards, obviously."

Lindsey stared up at building, drawing in front of Angel as he scanned the exterior. "Hey, I don't have my laptop."

Angel stopped and stared at him. "Huh?" he asked intelligently.

Coming to a stop as well and turning back to face him, Lindsey explained. "My computer. If you want me to hack into the system and break the codes I'm definitely going to need my -"

Angel broke in. "Wait, wait, wait. That seems like a big bother. What do you say we just fight, huh?"

Confused but willing to rumble, even if he had no fucking clue why Angel should suddenly turn violent on him now, Lindsey squared off hesitantly. Angel stared at him, shook his head a little and waved him away. "You might want to step aside."

It dawned on Lindsey that Angel meant they should fight together, not one another. Pissed off all over again and more than a little embarrassed by being so slow on the uptake, he moved out of the way. Without further ado Angel flung his ax through the window. Alarms went off all over the place. Angel clapped Lindsey on the shoulder.

"Come on," he invited. "Work off some of that aggression, huh?"

He had no idea how right he was. At least Lindsey hoped he didn't. The first wave of guards met them at the door, and Angel plowed into them with style, grace and enthusiasm. Lindsey threw and ducked punches, taking down those who managed to get past Angel, and in one instance, crunching one in the nose that Angel led directly on to his fist. It didn't surprise Lindsey that he and Angel could fight together as if they'd been doing it forever. These guards were all regular humans. They'd worked well together the first case they'd taken, and if the Brewer woman hadn't been an inhuman killing machine who'd kicked Lindsey's ass all over the room, he and Angel would have functioned like a well-oiled machine then, too.

Or maybe he was just kidding himself, putting oil, himself and Angel into a scenario all at the same time when neither of them was attempting to kill the other.

By the time the short, vicious fight was over, he felt much better. Angel didn't appear to have been affected one way or the other. Lindsey looked around the room, seeing cheesy posters, second generation computers, scratched desks, exotic flyers, all the accouterments of a travel agency and no signs of demonic activity.

Although it had been a long time since he'd used a travel agency. Hard to tell, with the demons in LA, what was a sign and what wasn't.

A hollow thump caught his ear and he turned around just as Angel announced, "Floor. It's hollow." Oh. Lindsey'd thought Angel'd been stomping around for the sheer joy of stomping.

They quickly shoved the ratty Persian-knock-off rug aside and looked at the trap door. Angel lifted it easily and gestured, gallantly, for Lindsey to take the lead. Lindsey glared at him. Walk into a possible trap of a pit in the ground with Angel at his back?

"No fucking way," he said bitingly. Angel rolled his eyes and gave a theatrical sigh, but they ended up walking down the stairs side by side. Lindsey was a little disappointed. While he had objections to walking in front of Angel, he had no objections to walking behind him. Nice view, in fact. Shrugging off the thought, he walked further into the chamber of horrors hidden in the basement and peered around.

What they found didn't shock Lindsey, proving that he was indeed as cynical as he expected, but he didn't quite understand what he was seeing. Under the bright lights, there were upright coffin-like capsules holding people suspended in liquid. Machines hummed around them, tubes feeding between them like a cabled web. It was the only sound in the stillness. Lindsey found himself asking a stupid question, but it was out before he could stop it.

"What is this?"

Angel gave him exactly the answer he expected. "You know what this is. Spare parts, for guys like you." Much as he tried to shield against them, the words were like little darts, drawing invisible blood. Angel went on. "You got your 'before' and your 'after.'" He took a closer look. Lindsey followed his lead, horrified but hiding it well as he took note of the missing limbs and eyes on some of the victims.

"More like 'during,' I guess," Angel continued thoughtfully. "Your firm in action, Lindsey. A lot to be proud of, huh?"

Lindsey glanced at him, then looked away. He was feeling off-balance. There was condemnation in Angel's eyes as he looked at him, and Lindsey clenched his jaw to keep himself from saying anything else stupid. That the scourge of Europe could be so self-righteously high and mighty -- he guessed that was what a soul and a shit-load of guilt could do to a guy. Lindsey had to admit, if only to himself, that he felt more guilt than he had in a long time, staring around at the bodies.

Angel moved toward a heavy purple banner with a gold symbol on it hanging from the corner of the ceiling. Lindsey looked up, but didn't recognize the hieroglyph.

"The Pockla blessed this place."

"Who are they?" Lindsey was relieved to have Angel's attention diverted from himself.

"Demon healers. They know how to regenerate flesh. Probably explains why some of these transplants aren't taking so well."

A blurry memory of a large red-robed being chanting over him, gnarled hands and an icy burn along his arm flashed through Lindsey's mind. "Yeah. I'm pretty sure one of them was there when they gave me my hand."

Angel turned on him. "Your hand? I think it belonged to that guy over there. Or what's left of him, anyway."

Biting his tongue again, Lindsey followed Angel's glance, turning to see a man with missing limbs suspended in fluid. To his horror, the man appeared to be conscious, staring pleadingly at him. Lindsey walked slowly over to stand in front of the tank, appalled. Softly, he murmured "Oh, god. I know him. I didn't get the name before."

He stared up into Brad's eyes, which were staring right back at him. Lindsey wondered if he would see tears if not for the fluid surrounding the ruined body. He said softly, "We worked in the mailroom together." The thought struck him that he had escaped, but Brad hadn't. This was one of the unspeakable things the Firm did to its failures. There were worse things than being forced to eat one's own liver. Much worse things than death. He thought of Lilah, then came back to the present. "Brad?" he asked tentatively.

Brad answered, sending more shivers down Lindsey's back. "Kill … kill …"

Anxiously, Lindsey questioned him, "Kill who? Huh? Who do you want me to kill?" Right then, he'd do it. Whoever had done this, he'd kill them. He'd liked Brad. Violence was rising in him at what had been done and how he had benefited from it. He wouldn't give his hand up, but he was incredibly angry at how he had gotten it. Guilt warred with rage and demanded an outlet. The answer he got stunned him.

"Kill me. Please!"

Lindsey stared at him, feeling pole-axed. He'd been expecting a plea for vengeance, not mercy. He threw a wild glance over his shoulder at Angel. For the first time, he asked for guidance. "What am I supposed to do here?"

Staring steadily back at him, Angel said quietly, "I know what I'd do. But this is your deal. Whatever it is, you better do it quickly. They're going to be coming in force so we've got to help the ones we can."

That hadn't done him any good. Lindsey looked back up at Brad, seeing madness and misery in the dark eyes staring down at him. He could feel tears starting in his eyes, misting his vision. He swallowed past a lump in his throat and silently begged Brad for his forgiveness. For being the unwitting cause for at least part of Brad's suffering, and for what he had to do to end it.

"I'm sorry."

The words burned his throat. Keeping his eyes locked on Brad's, he pulled the plug and watched the tank go dark. He held Brad's gaze until those sad eyes drifted closed, seeing gratitude there and hoping there was a measure of forgiveness as well. Behind him he could hear Angel reassuring the people he was rescuing. An eternity later, Brad was dead, and the rage banked in Lindsey broke free. He reached out blindly and smashed everything he could get his hands on. Angel stopped him, much too soon, with a touch to his arm. Lindsey stared blindly at him.

Angel's voice held a mixture of command and gentleness. "Help these people upstairs."

Reminded of the few who could be saved from the nightmare place, Lindsey returned to the living. He ushered frightened, Pockla-banner-draped survivors up the stairs, murmuring as comfortingly to them as he could when it felt like he had broken glass in his throat. As he got the last of them up the stairs and into the lobby he heard the hiss of gas below and realized Angel was going to torch the place. Even as he thought it, Angel joined them, gathering up a pile of papers and taking a lighter out of his pocket.

"Get 'em to the car."

Lindsey hurried the survivors across the street and helped them into the car. Three of them went into the back seat, one curled in the passenger seat. They were in shock, huddled together and shivering, crying softly. He tucked Pockla banners around them and patted shoulders, trying to radiate reassurance when what he really wanted to do was find something and kill it. Violently.

Shortly after they escaped, Angel came running out of the building. He'd cut it fine, but he made it as an explosion leveled the place. Angel stared at the car full of people, then, assessingly, at Lindsey standing on the curb.

"You coming?"

"You take care of them," Lindsey told him. "I'll walk."

Angel gave him a disbelieving look. "Long walk."

Not bothering to answer, Lindsey shrugged and turned away. He had a lot to think about, and he always thought better when he was walking. After a moment, he heard the engine catch and the car pulled away from him. He didn't look back.

Cutting through the alley across the street, he ducked incoming Wolfram and Hart security and headed back to his apartment. Angel was right, it was a long walk. But no one bothered him, and walking those miles in the cool night air helped him get his thoughts more straightened out than they had been in a very long while. By the time he got home, dawn was breaking, and he'd come to a decision.

He took a long, hot shower, washing away the stink of blood and fear, then pulled on his shorts. Standing at the window, he watched the city bustle as he drank a cup of coffee. Taking his time, he went into the kitchen, rinsed out his coffee cup, and picked up his cell phone from the countertop. His first call was to a bank in the Cayman Islands. His second was to a moving company, to come in and pack for him while he was at work. Knowing it would be some time before he would need it, he arranged for his stuff to be put in storage for an indefinite period.

That taken care of, he went into his bedroom and packed a single duffel bag. Jeans, shirts, various demon-fighting weapons, his shaving kit, the back-up disks with incriminating material on Wolfram and Hart that he'd kept from the Brewer case, underwear, some music, his .38 and a box of shells went into it. He stacked clean jeans, tee shirt, leather jacket, socks and boots next to it, and leaned his guitar case against it, then locked the closet holding them so the movers wouldn't take them.

He dressed carefully and drove to the Firm for the last time. Smiling at the guard, he greeted everyone he met pleasantly. Once in his office, he began going through his files, meticulously shredding papers. Booting up his desktop computer, he wiped and reformatted the hard drive. Then he carefully pried open the case and stuck his wooden-handled letter opener through the circuitry, skewering the memory so that nothing could be salvaged. Even magick couldn't recreate what had been burned to slag, not and make sense of it. He closed the case again and tucked his laptop in his briefcase. Locking it, he also took the time and care to mutter a binding chant over it, so if anyone other than himself attempted to open it, their hands would be fried.

Staring around his now-sanitized office, he allowed himself a satisfied smile. He went into the washroom, pausing to look at himself in the mirror for a long moment. For an instant he let the mask slip, grinning savagely at his reflection. Then he controlled himself and went off to the division re-evaluation meeting. Lilah was already there, looking close to the edge. He smiled gently at her. She snarled silently back at him. No more than he expected.

He was really looking forward to this.

Reed gave him a standard death's head smile. "Hello, Lindsey."

"Hello, Nathan," Lindsey returned in a friendly fashion. Reed looked at him expressionlessly for a moment, then smiled genially, signifying his approval of the unexpected familiarity. Lindsey smiled genially right back at him. Two more men entered the room, breaking off the smiling contest. Lindsey moved to sit next to Lilah, who was quivering like a tightly-stretched wire. He resisted the urge to give her a reassuring pat. She'd probably bite his hand off, and he'd just gotten it back.

With no further delay, Reed called the meeting. "Now that everyone's here, let's get started." Everyone still standing took a seat. Lindsey subtly positioned himself to grab Lilah when the time came to stop her from doing anything rash.

"These re-evaluations are always a bit of a mixed blessing," Reed began with blatantly false bonhomie. "It's sad as we lose one of our own. But also hopeful, as we turn toward the future and promote one of our own. Lilah, you have made a lot of great contributions, and I know you've tried your very, very best -"

Lilah cracked. Diving for the gun in her handbag she cried, "No!"

Clamping down on the bag and preventing her from drawing the pistol, Lindsey chided her gently, "Lilah. Lilah, please." She rolled her eyes at him, showing the whites. "They chose me. I'm clearly the guy."

Reed interjected approvingly, "Yes, you are."

Lilah continued to stare at him, fearful and shaking, as Lindsey smiled at her. "You could've had it, but you didn't have what it takes." He brought his right hand up suddenly and she shied away, gasping, as if fearing he was going to strike her. He barely kept himself from laughing aloud. "An evil hand!" he proclaimed.

She stared at him like he'd lost his mind. The room went still. This wasn't exactly how they'd expected the meeting to go.

"I mean, c'mon." Lindsey got up and began to stalk around the table toward Nathan, who stared at him as if he was a snake about to strike but didn't move or breathe a word. "Who here does? Leon doesn't. Charlie doesn't." Lindsey stopped to ruffle the hair of a man who had been worse than pompous to him in the past, playing his apparent madness for all it was worth. "You do know you gave me an evil hand, right?" he asked Reed in a conversational tone. Still addressing Reed, Lindsey backed toward the guard, playing to his entranced, shocked audience. "I've been writing 'kill, kill, kill' on everything. It's crazy." He waved both hands in the air just to see them flinch. "It's crazy! Anything could happen!"

He was in the perfect position to respond when Reed said, exactly as expected, "Allan -"

Lindsey turned to the guard, grinning maniacally. "Allan! How are you?" Still smiling, holding the man's attention, he disarmed the guard with his right hand while punching him in the jaw with a sharp left uppercut. "Uh-oh, uh-oh," Lindsey mocked the guard's poor efforts. As Allan tried to use his headset to call for help, Lindsey shot him in the foot with his own gun. The guard screeched. "Ooooh," Lindsey oozed false sympathy, his accent growing thicker with every word. "That's gonna hurt in the mornin'. Come here."

He wrapped a hand around Allan's neck and threw him to the floor, then turned to aim the stolen gun in the direction of the lawyers now cowering in as dignified a manner as possible. "Stop it, evil hand, stop it," he deadpanned.

Aiming to the left of Reed, he shot out vases and windows, the resulting shattering glass causing a satisfactory shower all over the carpet. Then he shot out the windows and objects d'art to the right of his soon-to-be ex-boss. Reed raised a hand involuntarily but refused to visibly panic.

"I just can't control my evil hand." Lindsey's tone was whimsical, and he was chuckling as he walked the length of the table back toward Reed. "Nathan, I'm so proud that you chose me." He gave Charlie another noogie just for the hell of it, hissing "Charlie!" to see his shoulders hunch up, then turned back to Reed. "But if I would have been in your shoes, I would have chosen Lilah. Let me tell you why."

He gestured at Lilah, standing frozen, staring at him wide-eyed, uncomprehending. "Do you have any idea the hours this chick has logged in? Huh? The files she has on you guys? Deep stuff." Glancing over at each person in turn as he mentioned them, Lindsey reeled off the list of malfeasance he well remembered from his own background investigations. "Ronnie! Your stock manipulations." Ronnie turned an interesting shade of green. "Nathan's little off-shore accounts."

Reed might as well have been carved from marble, he was so still. Lindsey came to a stop beside Lilah and touched her lightly on the arm. She recoiled but managed to control herself. "Can you imagine, if something were to happen to this girl and those files got back to the senior partners? They'd eat you alive! She's been working overtime, boys."

Returning to head of table, he addressed the group as a whole. "She's everything you ever dreamed of. Lilah is your guy." Dropping his voice, he turned and said confidentially to Reed, "Me, I'm unreliable. I've got these 'evil hand' issues …" For the first time since his performance began, he dropped the unnatural cheeriness and sounded completely serious, "and I'm bored with this crap."

Then he regained his grin and laid the gun gently on the table, secure in the knowledge that no one was going to move until after he was long gone. "And besides, I'm leaving. So if you want to chase me, be my guest. And remember," he flashed his right hand an inch in front of Reed's face. Reed didn't so much as blink. "Evil." He knocked on the table with the knuckles of his 'evil' hand just to see them jump, then turned to leave.

He hissed "Charlie!" one last time, seeing the arrogant idiot blanch another shade paler. With a whispered "Good luck!" to Lilah, he continued out the door, goosing her along the way. She jumped and squeaked, and he shrugged apologetically, holding up his hand as if to say he couldn't be held accountable for the actions of such an obviously unspeakably evil thing.

"Evil," he shrugged, and walked out the door.

Lindsey headed directly to his office, picked up his briefcase, and detoured to the front entrance. No one stopped him or even looked strangely at him. His guess would be that, other than revising the minutes and calling for an ambulance, the entire tableful of lawyers was still sitting there in Reed's office in shock. It wasn't often they were treated to a full mental meltdown from one of their own. And they'd probably never had one where the melter had afterward walked out of the Firm under his own steam.

He wasn't going to be demon kibble. Neither was Lilah. Fuck Wolfram and Hart. From here on out, Lindsey was going to play it **his** way.

Climbing into the Firm's Jag for one last spin, he stopped at a discreet unmarked office door in a professional building in West Hollywood, signed for a metal suitcase, and continued on to his apartment. He cranked up the radio and sang along, feeling as insane as he'd just pretended to be. The surface of his brain was surfing on a wave of adrenaline. The other 98% of it continued planning escape routes. His subconscious had been working on this since he'd first gone to Angel about the blind kids. He'd always been one for covering all the angles.

That talent would be the only thing to keep him alive and undamned, now.

The apartment echoed when he stepped into it. The movers had been and gone. The closet where he'd locked his gear was undisturbed. He placed the metal suitcase and his briefcase in the middle of the duffel bag, arranging the clothing around them and leaving the weapons in easy reach on top before closing it up. He stood at the window one last time, watching the sun set over the LA skyline.

Then he changed out of his suit and into his jeans. Hanging the suit neatly in the now-empty closet, he shrugged into his leather jacket and shouldered his duffel bag. Picking up the guitar case he walked out the door for the last time, not looking back there, either. He tossed the keys to the apartment and the Jag in the mail drop for the manager to sort out, then crossed the street to place his bag and guitar in the bed of his truck. He carefully smothered a grin when he saw Angel lurking by the tailgate. He knew he wouldn't be able to get away without one last slanging match with the vampire.

"If you're here to kill me, grab ya a ticket and get in line."

Angel didn't answer him directly. He looked at the truck instead. "You know, I really like this truck," he mused. "'56, right? First year they had wraparound windshields. You know, back in the fifties we all thought life was going to be like The Jettsons by now. Air cars. Robots. I'd love an air car. Wouldn't that be cool?"

Ironic, Lindsey thought, that one could take the boy out of Ireland, but couldn't take Ireland out of the boy. Angel never did leave the blarney behind. "So you're here to talk me to death."

He got a solemn look in response. "No. I just came to say things don't always work out the way you think. I bet Wolfram and Hart aren't too happy losing one of their best and brightest."

Lindsey tossed him a challenging half-grin. "Yeah, well, let 'em come try to stop me. It'll be fun."

Angel's eyes widened. "Well, I don't know if **that's** a healthy attitude. So, where are you going, Lindsey? Back to your roots?" Oddly enough, he sounded sincere, not mocking. Lindsey glanced at him, noted the lack of hostility, and softened his challenge.

"Something like that." He let the silence linger, waiting for Angel to blather some more. After a little while, he found himself talking instead. "I hope you're not waiting for me to tell you I learned some kind of lesson. That I had a big moral crisis but now I see the light."

That actually provoked a short laugh. "No, no, no. If you told me that, then I'd have to kill you." Angel paused, then looked at him seriously. "No, I'm just here to say bon voyage. Don't come back."

Lindsey'd been expecting that all along. "To LA? Nah." He opened the truck door then looked back at Angel. "You can have this place." There was nothing left here for him. Not his career, not Darla … not Angel.

"Good!" Angel told him cheerfully. Lindsey couldn't even rally the energy to wish for a stake. "I'm glad I didn't have to do something immature here."

Finding the whole scene weirdly amusing, Lindsey fought back another smile. His expression gradually turned serious. He wanted to go, but he needed to say something first. Whether the vampire knew it or not, he was still on the Firm's agenda. Lindsey didn't want to see Angel fall prey to them. He didn't examine his reasons for the warning he gave. He didn't really want to know. Hopeless causes had never been his favorites. "The key to Wolfram and Hart -- don't let them make you play their game. You gotta make them play yours."

Angel looked surprised. "Thanks. I'll keep that in mind."

Not knowing what else to say, Lindsey turned to climb into truck. Angel, of course, had to have the last word.

"Don't drive too fast, now. Lot of cops out there."

Lindsey peeled out just to spite him. He looked in the rearview mirror, but of course he couldn't see Angel. He laughed under his breath. Like so much of his life in LA, Angel was an illusion. A deadly one. He reached for the radio and set course for the 15 freeway. Along the way, a few people honked at him, and he could see them laughing. He shook his head. Angelinos. Too caught up in their SUVs to deal with a **real** truck. He ignored them and kept driving.

A mile outside Ontario, he saw flashing lights in his mirror. He glanced down at his speedometer but he'd been traveling a couple miles under the speed limit. Pulling over, he waited for the cop to come up to the side of the truck. Lindsey put on his most innocent expression, easy in this case since he hadn't actually done anything.

"Hello," he greeted the very tall, very beefy patrolman who glared at him through the window.

"License and registration, please," the cop snarled at him. Lindsey blinked. Okay. That hadn't been the reaction he expected.

Reaching carefully into the glove box, since the cop looked like he'd just as soon arrest Lindsey as look at him, he got out his registration. Equally as carefully, he drew out his wallet and handed his license and the truck's papers to the cop.

"Uhm," Lindsey asked tentatively, "What was I doing wrong, officer? I didn't think I was speeding." He widened his eyes and looked even more innocent.

The cop's attitude didn't soften. "Burned out tail light," he growled. Then he walked away, writing furiously on his pad. Lindsey watched him in the mirror. The cop stared at the truck's license plate for a long time, scowl settling firmly on his face, before stomping back to his patrol car and speaking on the radio for an inordinately long time. Lindsey would have gotten out and checked the light himself, but with the cop's bad attitude, he figured it would be safer to keep his butt in the truck.

"Sign here," the cop ordered him, thrusting the ticket book under his nose. Lindsey signed it, confused by the whole situation, then accepted the ticket that was ripped off and shoved at him. He watched the cop go back to his patrol car, stared down at the ticket, winced at the price, and very carefully pulled back out onto the freeway.

The traffic thinned out as he headed into the Angeles National Forest, and he didn't see very many other cars on the road until he was past Victorville. Then, for the second time that night, there were lights flashing in his window. He looked down at his speedometer again.

Three miles over the speed limit.

The thought struck him that Angel must have put a curse on his truck, as his second encounter with the California Highway Patrol followed a path much like the first. Not blaming the cops for the curse, he held on to his patience with both hands as he was barked at by yet another hostile policeman.

For the first time in his life, he got a speeding ticket for exceeding the posted limit by three whole miles. It was unheard of in California, where, if a driver didn't go at least ten miles over the limit on the freeway, he'd get run over by the hordes of speeders who were. Lindsey growled under his breath as he pulled away, very carefully, and merged with the nonexistent traffic. The cop followed him halfway to Barstow before finally giving up and going away.

Lindsey wracked his brain for the next sixty miles trying to think of ways to break curses placed on motor vehicles. He came up empty. Stopping at a brightly lit Mobile station, he filled the tank, not paying attention to his surroundings, totally caught up in trying to figure out what Angel had done to his truck and how to fix it.

The kid at the counter was giggling like an idiot when Lindsey paid him for the gas, but Lindsey ignored him. Who knew what kids were thinking these days, especially out in the middle of nowhere in the middle of the night with nothing else to do but wait to get robbed. The kid was probably high on something. Lindsey grabbed a Coke and headed back out to his truck.

He was on the 40 right outside Ludlow when the third cop pulled him over. Lindsey still hadn't managed to figure out just what Angel had done, and he hadn't been able to trace any magickal currents that would give him a hint. This time he'd been five miles over the speed limit, and he groused at himself for speeding at all. He'd been distracted. It didn't help.

This cop had a grin on his face. His attitude was better by far than the last two, but it still confused the hell out of Lindsey. Bright brown eyes twinkled at him from a classically handsome Hispanic face, and full lips twitched under a dark brown mustache. Lindsey found himself grinning back, but he knew his confusion was showing.

"Where you headed?" the cop asked him.

Lindsey stared at him, then shrugged. "Back home to Oklahoma. Had enough of LA," he finally answered.

The cop shook his head, laughing.

"Who'd you piss off, buddy? Break up with your girlfriend or something?"

A picture of Angel came to his mind, and Lindsey scowled automatically. "Something," he admitted.

"I'll let you off with a warning, this time," the cop told him. "But you, uh, might want to get your truck looked at."

He was still laughing when he got into his patrol car and drove off. Lindsey stayed at the side of the road, watching him, until the dust disappeared. Way too weird, he thought. Too tired to worry about it, he pulled carefully back onto the freeway yet again and headed off down the road.

Needles was a sleepy town that early in the day, but the restaurant in the truck stop was a good one, and they had showers. Lindsey parked and climbed from his truck, distracted by the sound of laughter coming from behind him. A nasty suspicion hit him that it hadn't been magick Angel had left on his truck, and he stalked around to glare at the back of his truck.

A sign the size of his tailgate mocked him. "COPS SUCK." Well, hell. No wonder he couldn't go half an hour without getting pulled over. He stared at the sign, caught between rage and laughter, before he finally gave in to the ridiculousness of the situation and cracked up. So Angel hadn't had to do anything immature, huh? Right. Sure.

Two hundred fifty going on twelve.

Lindsey tore the sign off and ripped it into bits. Tossing them in the truck bed, he went in for a breakfast of waffles and bacon, washed down by about a quart of coffee. Thirty minutes and a shower later, he felt human enough to get back on the road. Over the Arizona line in Kingman, it was late enough for the post offices to be open, and he stopped at the nearest one he found. Stuffing the torn pieces of the sign into a padded envelope, he added an itemized bill for the tickets he'd received, and sent the whole shebang off to Angel.

Postage due.

The drive was a good one, straight east across the country, the 40 to the 44 heading for Tulsa. He didn't think he'd stay there, but it was a place to start. The skies were clear, the wildflowers were in full spring bloom, and he felt more at peace when he was moving than he'd felt in the last ten years. He stopped only for food, gas, and to fall into bed.

Sleeping didn't take a lot of time out of his trip. His dreams kept cutting his rest short.

They followed the same pattern. His hand would turn on him, gouging out his eyes, ripping out his throat. He'd wake, screaming, muffling his screams with his fist, then yank his hand away from his mouth so fast he'd nearly pull his shoulder out of the socket. He'd get up, go to the bathroom, splash water on his face, stare in the mirror for a little while at the ghosts haunting his eyes, then go back to bed and try again.

The next round was more prophetic, if equally explicit. He'd be free, no one following him, no shadow of danger hovering over him. Then he'd be dead. Suddenly. Violently. An ax to the back of the head. A garrote around his throat. A knife gutting him. Inhuman hands ripping his body to pieces.

Death and freedom. He couldn't tell the difference between the two.

He'd wake again, unable to scream and gasping for breath, his heart pounding as if it was trying to escape from his chest. He'd be shaking, his skin covered in cold sweat, his eyes staring at nothing, trying to see the threat.

By that point, he'd give up and go drink some more coffee. Drive some more. Stay in the daylight where the dreams couldn't ambush him.

Just outside Amarillo in the pre-dawn hours of his third day on the road, the dreams caught up to him. They took the form of Keltor demons from Wolfram and Hart, and they planned to take away his bid for freedom by dealing him death.

As Angel had so rightly said, things didn't always go the way people expected.

The Benz came up to the side of him on the empty road, slamming into him with a force that could only be expected from titanium-armored, bullet-proof, demonically-enhanced bodywork. His truck didn't stand a chance. It bounced and swerved, going over the side and down the embankment, Lindsey fighting like hell to control the uncontrollable. A ton of pickup doing nose-stands was a scary thing to live through. But he did.

Wrenching the belt off, he dove out the side window, since the door was crumpled by impact with the hill they'd just rolled down. A Keltor caught him less than a yard from the wreckage of his truck, hands the size of dinner plates catching hold of his shoulders and pulling him completely off the ground. Lindsey hung there, feet dangling, and glared into the narrowed yellow eyes staring at him.

"Lilah says thanks," it grunted, then drew back its head to gore him.

She was so predictable.

"J'heelawah makagti!" Lindsey howled. The Keltor froze, its horn sticking in the suddenly gelid air between itself and its target. "Ma'la pliu rhakha yek'cha!"

The Keltor goggled at him as its horn began to melt. With a howl of its own, it dropped Lindsey and tried its damnedest to bat at the flames shooting out of its horn. Since it couldn't move its arms, it was a pathetic attempt at best. Lindsey left it to the magickal mire he'd cast and ran like a bat out of hell for the duffel bag he could see lying under a nearby scrubby bush. He reached for it as a second Keltor pelted over to him.

Ducking under the claws swiping at his head, Lindsey muttered a curse, non-magickal but calming nonetheless, and dove into the brush, snagging his duffel bag as he rolled past. He heard the Keltor huffing and slashing above him, and he hurriedly ripped open the bag and drew out a short-handled scythe and a bottle of pewter gray powder. Muttering incantations under his breath, he launched himself back into battle just as the first Keltor burst into flames with a hapless squeal.

An uppercut with the scythe gutted the second Keltor as it jumped at him. He didn't take the time to kick the corpse off the weapon, simply swung it around and knocked the third Keltor off its feet with the bulk of the second. Biting the seal off the bottle, he threw the contents in a wide spray, coating a fourth and fifth as they came scrambling down the hill toward him.

Their screams of agony as their limbs began instantly to rot distracted the third one long enough for Lindsey to finally shake the corpse off his scythe and chop the third's head off with it. Taking a deep breath, trying not to gag on the smell of demon ichor, he hunched his shoulders and waited for the last one to land on him.

They always hunted in packs of six. It was a holy number for them. Lindsey grimaced. Keltor and rednecks. Wasn't a hell of a lot of difference between them. Big, mean and stupid. A rustle directly behind him and a shadow above were all the warning he got as the final Keltor flew at him. He waited until the last possible moment before shooting the scythe straight up.

Directly into, and through, the Keltor's belly.

The resulting rush of gore covered Lindsey from his hair to the heels of his boots. He scrunched his eyes shut and tried not to breathe too deeply. Keltor innards tasted like shit.

Scraping the worst of the gore off, Lindsey slogged back along the hill from the scene of the carnage to take a look at his truck, scooping his duffel bag up on the way. What he saw disheartened him. The bed had collapsed inward. The frame was bent completely out of true. The roof was crushed. Every bit of glass on it was shattered.

The radio was still playing.

If that wasn't enough, his guitar case was lying up against the base of a tree. Broken to bits. The lock had sprung and the guitar itself was in three shattered pieces. Crushed. Useless.

Something in Lindsey snapped.

He'd given them the chance to back off. They hadn't taken it. They knew what he had on them and they'd come anyway. He'd given Lilah her **life** back, and she'd panicked and tried to kill him in spite of it. They really should have left it alone. Let him go. He wouldn't have bothered them if they hadn't taken it back to him, and they'd known it. They hadn't heeded his warning. He should have been expecting it. Deep down, he had. They'd wanted him permanently out of the way and they'd failed to put him there.

Their mistake.

Turning away from the kindling that used to be his guitar, closing his duffel bag and slinging it in the back seat of the Benz, he stalked over to the remains of the Keltor demons and rummaged through pockets until he found the keys. Back at the Benz, right there beside the road, he stripped off, using the liter bottles of spring water he found in the trunk to rinse off as much of the blood and ichor as he could. Tossing his ruined clothes down atop the demon corpses, he held his hands steadily over the field of battle, palms down.

Closing his eyes, he called Power to him and channeled it over the area. Flesh bubbled and sank into the ground, material disintegrated, and when it was over the only sign remaining of the fight that had taken place was his poor destroyed truck. Placing his hands against the earth, he leached the last of the Power out from his body back to the ground it came from, and walked a little shakily back to the Benz.

Pulling clean clothes out of his bag, he dressed and got behind the wheel. Pointing its nose back the way he'd come, Lindsey headed for a showdown he'd wanted to avoid. Since he couldn't, he was going to make damned sure he won.

He didn't want to consider the alternatives. Death wasn't so bad. Life as one of Wolfram and Hart's imprisoned enemies didn't bear thinking on.

The sun had long set when he arrived back in LA. He drove straight through, heading directly for Angel Investigations. Reaching over the seat into the duffel bag, he took out the metal suitcase and extracted several bundles of money from it. Then he shoved it under the seat, set the car alarm and headed for the office. Wesley started up in surprise when he came stomping in the door. Gunn took a defensive position flanking Wesley.

"Lookee here, it's the singin' lawyer," he cracked. Lindsey ignored him.

Wesley sniffed the air delicately, then pinned Lindsey with a stare. "Keltor ichor and the lingering residue of dark Magick. What on earth have you been up to?"

Lindsey ignored him, too. Angel and Cordelia came from a room to the right of the counter, and while Cordelia was goggling at him, Angel was beaming at him. "I thought I told you not to come back?"

"Stop grinnin' like a damned fool and get your butt over here." He could have heard a pin drop in the ensuing silence. "I got a job for you. All of you." He swept the gathering with a laser glare.

"Doin' what?" Gunn asked for all of them.

"A jihad," Lindsey told him, staring at Angel, who'd lost the grin and was now staring equally as intently at Lindsey. He didn't look convinced.

"There is no way we would ever consider working for you," Cordelia informed him, her nose in the air. "You're **evil**!"

Lindsey threw five hundred thousand dollars in untraceable bills on the counter. Cordelia, Gunn and Wesley stared at it. Angel kept staring at Lindsey.

"And rich," Gunn said solemnly.

"Very," Wesley told the money, his mouth hanging slightly agape.

"Well, maybe you're not **that** evil." Cordelia inched toward the money. "And you are pretty hopeless. And we are supposed to help the hopeless." Her voice trailed off as she ran a finger over a bundle of fifty dollar bills.

"I take it you have a plan?" Angel asked him.

Lindsey held his gaze steadily. "Make Wolfram and Hart ground zero of the apocalypse."

That jolted Gunn and Wesley out of their cash-induced trance. Cordelia kept stroking it, uncaring of the blueprint for disaster being sketched out over her head.

"We up for this?" Gunn asked uneasily. Lindsey and Angel nodded in the affirmative.

"It's suicide," Wesley pronounced. Before Lindsey could answer him, Cordelia shrieked and wheeled away from the counter, hands leaving off caressing the money in order to clutch her head.

"Jesus," Gunn muttered as Angel ran to catch her and Wesley looked on helplessly. "Not another one!"

Lindsey looked over at him, cocking an inquisitive brow. "Have they been coming more often?" He pitched his voice to carry over Cordelia's piteous whimpering. Gunn shrugged one shoulder, but Wesley answered him.

"Yes," he admitted. "They've been coming more often, and the effects have been lasting longer."

Looking down at Cordelia, burying her aching head against Angel's chest, Lindsey narrowed his eyes. Holding his hands out, framing Cordelia between his fingers like a director framing a shot, he began to chant softly. Wesley started, and Gunn stepped forward, only to stop as Wesley caught his arm and shook his head 'no.' A pale gold mist rose around Cordelia, gradually taking the shape of tendrils stabbing into her.

"A magickal attack?" Wesley added a sub-chant to Lindsey's, and the mist intensified. Now the tendrils looked like tiny snakes, hissing and writhing, attacking Cordelia from every direction.

Lindsey stopped chanting, and Wesley followed suite. "I recognize the signature." Everyone except Cordelia stared over at him. She was still trying to crawl into Angel's chest. "Lilah Morgan." Angel's face twitched, almost vamping at the name. Lindsey nodded. "You don't have a choice in this one, folks. Wolfram and Hart have declared war on your seer. You wanna join me now?"

Angel growled. Wesley took off his glasses and rubbed his eyes. Cordelia continued to whimper softly. Gunn answered for all of them.

"We in."

Events escalated. The newly-formed coalition of Wolfram and Hart attackers gave the Firm no time to prepare and no warning before they struck.

Nathan Reed was the first to die. They tracked him to a compound northwest of Twenytnine Palms, deep in the Mojave where there was nothing but sand, cactus, and an occasional Marine Corps bombing run gone awry. They struck in the dead of night to make the most of Angel's skills, sheltered behind the steel walls of Gunn's modified humvee. Cordelia threw flash grenades when Gunn told her to, Angel took the wheel, and Gunn manned the stake-thrower. Wesley and Lindsey created a feedback loop of misdirection and confusion, rendering Reed's magickal defenses moot, as Gunn and Angel took out the demon and human guards.

Once inside the grounds, the protective enchantment broken, the wizards joined the physical fray. Wesley planted gelignite at the doors of the inner sanctum, behind which Reed frantically summoned help from the senior partners. Lindsey drew an AK-47 from the back of the humvee and took down a wave of Uuhnit guard demons boiling up from fissures forming in the earth. Before Reed could complete his summons, the doors blew.

The explosion flattened everyone, attackers and defenders both. Wesley dragged himself to his feet and blushed. Gunn grinned at him.

"You gonna bang, bang big," he complimented, and Wesley threw him an abashed grin in return. They turned as one and started in on the demons who were beginning to stagger to their feet.

Lindsey left them to their flirtation and followed Angel into the shell of the bunker where Reed now gathered the last of his demon defenders. As Angel vamped out and began rending body parts from assorted vicious guards, Lindsey pulled his .38 from its holster at the small of his back and sighted carefully. He'd loaded it with special, ensorcelled, silver-plated, hollow-nosed bullets for precisely this purpose. As he sent two rounds into the center of Nathan Reed's head, he was glad he'd taken the precautions he had.

Normal humans didn't bleed neon orange. They didn't grow new heads, either. The third shot took the new head off at the neck. He ducked a body Angel diverted his way, glancing down at it long enough to ensure it was too dead to be a threat, and aimed again. The fourth and fifth shots destroyed Reed's chest.

Lindsey stepped around a small knot of Rancker demons trying to chew Angel's arms off, ignoring the slightly plaintive, "A hand here?" coming from the center of the group, to check on Reed. The corpse was still shifting, trying to regenerate. Lindsey put his final four rounds into the neck, chest and two to the gut. It finally gave a defeated sound and stopped moving.

Satisfied that he'd finally killed whatever the hell Nathan Reed had been, Lindsey turned, grabbed up a discarded machete, and waded in to help Angel. He whacked at the Ranckers like weeds and they finally started to fall away. Eventually, with him working from the outside and Angel working from the inside, they got all the little bastards put down.

Angel looked like hell. He was paler than normal, so his skin almost glowed, and he had small seeping wounds all over him. Unidentifiable fluids, three different shades of blood and assorted cast-off demon parts covered his clothes, what hadn't been torn to pieces in the onslaught. Lindsey couldn't help himself.

He dropped the machete, held one hand out for Angel to pull himself up with and grabbed the front of Angel's shirt with the other. When he got within striking range, still off-balance, Lindsey kissed him.

Other than the demon goop on his mouth, he tasted pretty good.

To his vague surprise, Angel didn't clobber him when Lindsey finally had to stop to draw breath. He simply straightened, plucked Lindsey's hand off his shirt, and gave him a measuring look.

"Feel better?" he asked whimsically.

Lindsey's grin in return felt feral. "Not yet, but soon." Then he walked past Angel, patted him once on the ass, and went to join the rest of the group at the humvee.

Hell of a better handful than he'd gotten when he'd goosed Lilah, he had to admit. Angel looked at him again, but this time it was with a lopsided grin and a hint of fire. Lindsey snorted to himself. Yeah. It wasn't only Lindsey, and Angel knew damned good and well what they'd been dancing around for the last year. Kiss or kill. Wasn't much of a dividing line between the two when it came to him and Angel.

Not that they had a chance to explore the ramifications of that particular self-discovery in the next several hours. Once begun, the war could not be delayed. They had to hit fast, hard, and with finality. Their only advantage was speed, and they made full use of it.

On the way back from taking out Reed, with four hours left to go before daylight, they swung through Palm Springs. The shiny new Convention Center was a haven for Wolfram and Hart subcontractors of all types, and at two in the morning there were no innocents around to be caught in the crossfire. A small block of C4 was delivered via crossbow into the center of the main hall, detonated by remote a second before the arrow hit. The ensuing explosion leveled the Center.

In the rubble were the dead bodies of over two dozen high-level Firm subcontractors and half a dozen executives, including the heads of internal security, communications and interdimensional pathways. If the remainder of Wolfram and Hart were going to call on the senior partners now, they were going to need more than a chant and a ring to raise them.

All the humans except Lindsey flaked out in the back of the humvee, catching what rest they could before the assault on headquarters began. He sat up in the cab, watching Angel drive. Angel was humming again. Off-key. Lindsey consciously unclenched his jaw.

"You seem happy," he said, trying to stop Angel from humming any more. Angel flashed him a broad grin. It looked a little strange on his face, but Lindsey liked it.

"What's not to be happy about? We're raining destruction down on the evil forces of the earth all in the cause of good, and saving your ass while we're at it. What's not to like?"

Lindsey smirked at him. "So you're okay with saving my ass instead of busting it now? Or is this a temporary truce, until the Firm's gone and you're no longer on retainer?"

Angel flashed him another look, darker than the grin but no less enjoyable. "Oh, I don't know, Lindsey. I'd say we have the beginning of a beautiful friendship here." This time he couldn't quite smother his snort. Angel chuckled. "What, you don't want to be my friend?"

"Gotta admit, I got the urge to fuck you blind, but I still can't say I like you much."

Lindsey's unvarnished honesty startled a laugh out of Angel. "I don't know, Lindsey. I think we have a lot in common."

"Like what?" Offhand, he couldn't think of a damned thing.

"Want a list?" Angel was stalling. Lindsey grinned.

"Sure."

"We've got the same sense of humor," Angel cracked. Then his tone changed. "We’re neither as evil as we think we are, nor as good as we could be." His voice was completely serious, and his eyes looking over at Lindsey were still as the grave. Lindsey swallowed.

"I guess that's a start." He took a breath, trying to clear a head gone suddenly foggy. Something about that look threw him for a loop. "Later. When we've got time."

"Yeah?" Angel's eyes were back on the road.

Lindsey settled into his seat, watching Angel from the corner of his eye. "I wanna hear that list."

The assault on Wolfram and Hart's corporate headquarters began less than two hours later. Gunn blocked the accelerator on the humvee and ran it directly into the front windows as he and Wesley came up through the parking garage in the back, taking out demon guards as they went. Angel and Lindsey used the faked identification card to go up the executive elevator along the side. It was a short but eventful ride. Vampires could move damned fast when they wanted to, and Angel had Lindsey thoroughly felt-up between the fifth and eleventh floors. He barely had time to catch his breath and glare at the deceptively innocent-looking vampire by the time the elevator car arrived at the thirtieth floor.

Once the doors opened, they met guards armed with stakes, who'd responded to the shaman's vampire-alert, with wide-dispersal pepper spray. While the humans were digging at their eyes, Lindsey ducked under as Angel came over, killing all three demons in human guise, who weren't affected by the pepper spray, with a single slice of his battle-ax.

"Nice aim," Lindsey told him absently, brushing demon glop off his arm and reaching out toward the magickal defense grid guarding the inner conference room with his right hand. Since being blessed by the Pockla, it was more attuned to enchantment than his left. Angel grunted acknowledgment of his compliment and turned to meet the charge of four more Gojya demons as Lindsey closed his eyes and concentrated on spell-casting.

It was a tough one, and he felt his concentration falter under the strain, only to be joined by the familiar sound of Wesley chanting firmly in counterpoint. Lindsey grinned briefly as their reinforcements arrived, then hissed the final few syllables of the spell. Angel dispatched the last of the guards and turned to the door, ramming it side by side with Gunn. The door flew open, imploding under the force of Lindsey's spell, Angel's shoulder and Gunn's foot. Cordelia brought up the rear, whining fitfully about the disgusting mess but not letting that slow her down.

Wesley cried out "Thicken!" and the three figures in the center of the room slowed to a standstill, caught in the amber the air had become. Lindsey called counter, "Flow!" and the attackers scattered into the room. Wesley and Gunn fought shoulder to shoulder, downing the last of the defenders' guards, as Lindsey and Angel headed for the nerve center of Wolfram and Hart. Ronnie, Leon and Charlie were gathered over a wavering section of expensive Persian carpet, struggling to force the last of the summoning words through throats frozen by Wesley's magick as they fought to create a stable portal between the room and the plane where the senior partners dwelt.

They failed. Angel's sword took Leon's head from his shoulders at the same time that Lindsey stuck his ax through Ronnie's mid-section, cleaving him neatly in two. Angel then butted Charlie in the face with the sharpened hilt of his sword, but the man didn't go down. His human visage tore and peeled away, showing the ridged lime-colored skull of a Melwocg demon. Lindsey grimaced.

"Cripes," he grumbled as he swung his ax around and started chopping away at Charlie, "if I'd've known what I was playing with I wouldn't've ruffled your hair. I'd've whacked your head off then!" He didn't get very far with the ax, but he distracted Charlie long enough for Angel to stick his hand in one of the holes he'd made and grab the base of Charlie's backbone. He put one foot on Charlie's ass and, with a heaving wrench, Angel ripped the Melwocg's spine out, effectively turning him inside out. "Just like skinnin' a rabbit," Lindsey commented, watching Charlie's head disappear into his body cavity.

"Whatever works," Angel growled. He snapped the spine in two pieces and shook the bloody muck off his hands. "Yuck."

Lindsey started to make a smart-ass remark back when he felt the building shake.

"Quake?" Cordelia asked hopefully. She didn't look like she believed it.

"We should be so lucky," Lindsey answered her, running for the door. Angel, Gunn, Cordelia and Wesley followed close on his heels. The epicenter for the rumbling was a familiar office -- it used to be his own, and it now had Lilah Morgan's name on the door. He groused internally that it hadn't taken long for her to take over, then he stopped dead. "Sonofabitch," he whispered.

Angel stopped beside him, looking at him with concern. "What is it?"

"She got through. Duck!" There was no time for any further warning.

The volley of flames nearly incinerated them when it took out the door separating the office from the hall. Lindsey squinted up through the glare and saw a half-terrified, half-defiant Lilah in the center of the office. She was glowing, floating a few inches above the carpet as the senior partners used her body as a channel for the power they couldn't bring to bear directly against Lindsey and his allies.

"She's not going to last long, with that sort of energy running through her." Wesley had to shout to be heard over the wind howling through the halls.

"She ain't gonna last long anyhow," Gunn told him, then locked glances with Angel. They nodded, and rolled in opposite directions under the wave of fire cascading over them. It split to try to cover all of them, and Lilah cried out in pain at the effort. Lindsey had seen it coming, and reached over to lock his hand around Cordelia's wrist.

"Close your eyes and try to relax!" he yelled at her. She looked at him like he'd lost his mind, but she did as he'd told her. He was dimly aware of Wesley placing both hands on his shoulders, and he was thankful for the added support, but all his awareness was concentrated on opening and following the connection from Cordelia back to the Powers That Be. They needed more firepower than they had and there was only one nexus of energy strong enough to stop the senior partners. Lindsey planned to make full use of every weapon he could find.

The sudden ringing of chimes all around them froze every combatant in place. For an instant all was silence save for the tiny bells, then a blast of freezing cobalt air swirled in a miniature tornado with Lindsey, Cordelia and Wesley at the eye of the storm. It swept out from them to meet the rush of fire, stopping it in place but not quite extinguishing it. Lindsey felt as though someone had ripped the top of his skull open and drenched his brain with dry ice.

As quickly as it began, it was over. The fire disappeared, and with it, the icy wind. The strange paralysis that had gripped them was gone, and they all surged to their feet. There were more beings in the room now, minion fighters the senior partners had managed to create before having their power conduit frozen closed by the Powers. Two more fully formed figures directed their efforts. It appeared that a couple of the senior partners had managed to make the transition despite the Powers' help.

Gunn, Wesley, Angel and Lindsey threw themselves into the room. Cordelia danced around the door, hitting anything that came within striking distance with a modified baseball bat Gunn had given her. The sounds of battle rose to an unearthly screech.

As the fight raged around them, Lindsey got close enough to reach Lilah. She was shaking, buffeted in all directions by the physical and metaphysical combat surrounding her. Lindsey caught her arm and pulled her to him, screaming up into her face, "You should have left it alone!" He caught her chin and kissed her softly, and her eyes closed. A single tear trembled on her lashes before sliding down her cheek.

A warning tingle went down his back and he swung around, holding Lilah in front of him as a human shield. The spell one of the senior partners had flung at him caught her full force, her body jerking in his hold as it absorbed the destructive power. She didn't even have time to scream before she bled out from the massive wounds in her torso. Lindsey let loose with a full-throated roar as he called on all the Power he could muster and threw it, along with Lilah's corpse, at the senior partner.

When it hit, the partner exploded as if her body had been a hand grenade. Sickly yellow fire flew from him in all directions, destroying three minions who'd had the misfortune of being within range.

Wesley had pinned the second senior partner with a web of sorcery, but was weakening rapidly. Angel and Gunn were bogged down with minions, fighting their way toward him. Lindsey staggered toward Wesley, helped unexpectedly as Cordelia came up beside him and caught him around the waist, carrying him forward. He clutched her shoulder to steady himself as he concentrated the last of his energy on the second senior partner. Its struggles lessened but it was still in danger of escaping when Angel suddenly sliced through the last of the defenders and threw himself at the partner.

It took his battle ax, his fangs, and both hands, but he finally managed to rip the partner's head off. The body folded in on itself and the head turned to ashes in his hands as the partner was returned to hell. Lindsey took a deep breath.

Promptly gagged so hard from the stench he nearly fell over.

Angel caught him as Cordelia lost hold of him. Strong hands, slick with blood and other bodily fluids and smelling of death, held him to a rock-hard chest. Lindsey gave half a second's thought to staying there for a few decades. Then he felt the rumble increase under his feet and knew if they didn't get the hell out of there ASAP, he wouldn't have even the next few minutes, much less decades. Pulling himself upright, he grabbed Angel's hand and yelling "OUT!" he ran for the door.

Gunn and Wesley caught an exhausted Cordelia between them, and the group fled at the highest speed they could manage for the express elevators. They could hear the floors exploding above them as the car sped downward. Hitting the lobby at the same time the tenth floor joined the previous twenty in oblivion, they skidded down the stairs and literally fell into the humvee. Angel shoved Lindsey in the cab, tossed Cordelia in the back as Wesley and Gunn jumped in to catch her, and kicked the block away from the peddle, reversing the humvee out of the ruined lobby as fast as he could. Fortunately, when Gunn was modifying it, he'd given the engine more pull than anything the original manufacturers had envisioned.

It was a damned good thing. They'd barely cleared the perimeter of destruction when what had once been a multi-story steel and marble building disappeared into a hole in the ground, flames and glass exploding in all directions. Lindsey glanced up at the dawn beginning to brighten the horizon and pulled on Angel's sleeve. Tired brown eyes pulled away from the fireworks marking the grave of Wolfram and Hart, looking over at him from a preternaturally pale face painted with blood and grime.

"Huh?" Angel asked. Lindsey pointed at the sun, starting to make its way up.

"Didn't make it through that conflagration just to have you go up in smoke from the sun. Put it in gear and get us the hell away from here."

For once, Angel didn't have a single thing to say about being ordered around. He simply put the humvee on the road and got them the hell away from there.

Back at the hotel, nobody was inclined to speak. Cordelia had a glazed expression on her face that mirrored Lindsey's feelings exactly, and the rest of them weren't far behind. By unspoken consent, they all wandered away to find a shower and a bed. Cordelia went one way, Gunn and Wesley went another. Lindsey followed Angel. Once in his bedroom, Angel stood in the middle of the room and looked around blankly. Lindsey stepped around him and headed directly for the shower.

No way was he going to smell like that a second longer than absolutely necessary.

The water felt like heaven raining down on him, washing away the grime, soot, residual traces of magick, blood, gore, ichor and fatigue. Lindsey closed his eyes and put his face up to the water, losing himself in the glorious sensation of being clean. He didn't even flinch when the door to the shower opened and Angel stepped in behind him.

"You asked me the other night if I wanted to share," Angel purred into his ear as he ran his hands up and down Lindsey's arms. Lindsey tried not to shiver. Angel's hands were **cold**. "So I'm answering you now. Yes. I want to share."

Lindsey grinned, leaning back a little, getting used to the chill as it spread down his back and into his legs where he came into contact with Angel's body. "Wasn't exactly what I had in mind."

"Wasn't it?" Angel dared him.

He thought about it, his head tipping automatically to the side as Angel leaned down to nuzzle at the side of his neck. "Maybe," he conceded. One large hand came around his hip and started playing at his groin. He gasped at the contrast of cold and heat between Angel's fingers and his own cock. "Okay, yeah, it could've been."

There was a quiver of movement behind him, and he groaned, knowing without having to look that Angel had just vamped out. "Maybe?" A fang stung the soft skin over his jugular, and he moaned. "Could've been?" The fingers pulled harder, and Lindsey arched into both the touch and the bite.

"I am so fucking twisted," he sighed, admitting to himself that he'd wanted this from Angel since the first time he'd met him.

"And this is news to you?" The hand dipped, circling the base of his cock and pumping hard. At the same time, the fang broke the surface of his skin and a rough tongue lapped at the tiny spill of blood. Lindsey felt his mind spasm and lost track of the conversation completely.

It was just as well. The best he could do for language wasn't intelligible as such. The hot water pouring over him and the cool touch taking control of him were all he could feel, and he gave himself up to the sensation. There was a fine line between love and hate, and it was such a change to feel anything at all that he let it blur. He'd take either. Both. Anything Angel would give him. Anything he could make Angel give him.

Then he was coming, and Angel was biting him harder, and there was a line of fire running through his chest from his cock to his throat. All Angel. Pleasure and pain mixed together, knocking him off his feet. Angel caught him.

The tile was wet against his cheek as he was leaned against it, fingers working inside him that took the heat from his body and reflected it back to him. Then Angel was working his way inside, and Lindsey rocked to his toes with each thrust. He felt full to burst, and it was another kind of pleasure/pain, as intense if not moreso than the first. Too tired to get hard again, too caught up in the sensations not to respond, he felt the tip of his cock slap gently against the wet tiles, streaking them with leaking semen. The world was nothing but the strong hands on his hips, the cock moving in him, the wet hair brushing against his cheek and the hungry mouth lapping at the blood seeping down the side of his throat.

He passed out before Angel finished. When he came to, he was dry, in bed, with Angel wrapped around him like an octopus. He wriggled. Angel didn't move. A very large, dead octopus with an unbreakable hold. For some reason this didn't bother him as much as it might. Maybe it was because he had no burning desire to escape.

Giving up on anything resembling rational thought until he'd gotten some sleep, Lindsey squirmed until his ass was flush against Angel's groin and closed his eyes. Surely when Angel awoke he'd get the hint. Lindsey'd conked out in the middle of the first time. He wasn't about to miss the second. Until then, he was going to go to sleep and dream of sweet escape and even sweeter showers.

Of course, it didn't quite work out that way. The Powers That Be didn't appreciate being summoned like servants, even when it was for the good of the light. Anyone arrogant, or desperate, enough to do so would soon find themselves answering for their actions. Lindsey was no exception to the rule.

His eyes flew open and he was startled to find himself in a marble hall with light blue satin hangings decorating the Doric columns surrounding him. Lindsey blinked. Shivered. It was cold. Looked down at himself.

Great. Called to defend himself to the Higher Powers, and himself naked as the day he was born. He took a deep breath.

"Explain yourself," a voice echoed inside his head and pressed in from all sides.

"I'm sorry," he began, then thunder shook the marble beneath his feet, and his jaw froze shut.

"You have disdained us, turned from us, fought us for years. Now you turn to us in your time of need. Explain yourself."

He was a lawyer, Lindsey told himself. He could do this. Unfortunately, when he opened his mouth to speak, no words emerged.

As it turned out, he didn't have to talk. Energy invaded his mind, much like the mind-readers at Wolfram and Hart only immeasurably more powerful. The assault upon his thoughts brought him to his knees with a keening cry of pain. Images flashed in front of his eyes. His mother, lying pale and cold, the bedding beneath her wet with fever-sweat, her staring eyes seeing nothing. His little sister, not waking up in the morning after an extremely cold night with no coal in the house to heat it.

His baby brother, in the crib, making no noise, sleeping, then not sleeping, but still not moving. His daddy, punching the side of a tree, blood running from split knuckles and tears running down his face, as they packed up the truck with what the could carry and headed off down the road. Hungry, again. Always. The first time he was beaten on the school yard, and the second, and the twentieth, before he was big enough and mean enough to fight back, and canny enough to find allies.

Looking through the window at his oldest sister, standing by the bus stop as he left them all behind. The conscious decision to be something he had never been, and to never be what he had once been. Hearing his mama cry somewhere beyond his sight the first time he cast a spell and killed a man. Closing his heart and doing it anyway.

The pain built in his mind until all he could see was white fire. Then another face floated past his vision, a little blind boy, huddled against his side, trusting him to save his life. A second child, and a third, and his own voice telling them over and over that it would be all right. They were safe. He would keep them safe. The white light receded, and he saw Darla's blue eyes as he told her that she was going to die. As he did whatever he had to do to ensure she would not.

Even damning her against her will.

Brad's dark eyes, pleading with him. Condemning him. Forgiving him. Holland's face stared down at him, shaking his head, disappointment in his eyes. Cordelia's, filled with pain; Wesley's, with suspicion; Gunn's, with disgust. Angel.

Smiling at him.

Holding him.

Killing him.

The last vision struck a chord, and he fought back, rage and desperation saving him from oblivion as they so often had. It wouldn't happen. Not now. They weren't enemies any more, there was no need for any more death, he would go --

The light hit him like a hammer, shutting him down. He whimpered.

He would stay. Words swept through his mind, whispering in a surprising soft brogue, and he listened. He would stay, and he would seek redemption. He would atone for his crimes. He would stay and protect the innocent as he had so often preyed upon them in the past. The light swirled into a concentrated eddy, moving around him, sliding up his body to bite suddenly, deeply, into the side of his neck. He cried out, but he couldn't tell if it was from pain or pleasure.

The light vanished and he woke with a start. Angel's arm still pinned him to the mattress and there was no movement from behind him. Slipping out from under the deadweight, Lindsey pulled on a pair of boxers he found lying on a chair and walked into the sitting room of the suite. Clicking the television on, he slumped in a chair and watched images flicker by. A local news team interrupted his mindless staring and he sat up straighter, narrowing his eyes at the screen.

A pretty Asian woman in no-nonsense black stood beside the crater that had once been Wolfram and Hart. Gesturing at the wreckage, she pulled a strand of hair from the corner of her mouth and launched into her report.

"An earthquake struck in the early morning hours here in Los Angeles, rattling windows and causing minor damage for an area covering several miles. The epicenter is not yet determined at this time, but there was some damage caused by the quake. Most of it was minor, but here on the west side there was some severe damage. We've had no reports of injury or loss of life, but the property damage here was extensive. There used to be an office building behind where I'm standing now, but a gas leak caused by the earthquake sent explosions ripping through what was once a well-respected law firm. The building exploded, leaving only this crater behind." She was still talking when a hand reached over his shoulder and turned it off.

"Well, that's one way to explain the unexplainable," Angel said, dropping his hands onto Lindsey's shoulders, rubbing the tense muscles there. Lindsey looked up at him over the back of the chair.

"One of the unexplainables," he said quietly. He let the words trail up slightly at the end, turning the statement into a question. Angel met and held his gaze.

"Sex with you has an obvious explanation," Angel informed him. "You're not exactly hard on the eyes."

"Same to ya," Lindsey told him, not sure how far to go with it, and not yet comfortable enough to share the dream he'd had of the Hall of the Powers.

Angel finished his rubdown with a little pat on his shoulder, then moved to stand next to the couch. He hovered there for a moment, uncertain in his movements, before perching on the end cushion. "So, what's the plan now?"

Lindsey gave him a questioning look, and Angel shrugged, waving his hands in Lindsey's general direction. "For you. What are you going to do now? Head back to wherever you came from? I mean, Wolfram and Hart shouldn't be much of a threat to you for awhile at least, until they can get their act back together, so you should be safe. For some time, anyway. You won't have to keep looking over your shoulder."

He went on chattering as Lindsey got up, walked over to the couch, and sat beside him. Angel closed his eyes as Lindsey's body heat reached him.

"Well, I'm kinda at loose ends at the moment. You got any suggestions?" He leaned a little closer. Angel opened his eyes and gave Lindsey the shadow of a smile.

"A few."

"Like what?"

"I like the way you look in my shorts." Angel moved faster than the human eye could track, and the next thing Lindsey knew he was flat on his back with Angel lying over him, dangling the shorts in his face. "Think I like the way you look out of 'em even better."

Lindsey looped his arms around Angel's neck and pushed up with his hips, bucking them off the couch and onto the carpet, rolling until he was straddling Angel and peering down into his face. "I can work with that. You know I got an evil hand, right?"

Angel leered at him. "So? I can work with that." They rolled again and Angel pinned Lindsey, grinding against him. Lindsey moaned. "I've got **two**," Angel whispered in his ear as he put those hands to good use driving Lindsey out of his mind. Lindsey gave up the fight. He had time to tell Angel what the Powers That Be had decreed. Later.

Much later.

**end**


End file.
